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A CROYDON
EPISODE.
ROBERT RODOLPH SUFFIELD.
MAT BE HAD OF
Mr. WARREN, Bookseller, 131 High Street,
Croydon.
a.d. 1876.
�LONDON:
FEINTED BY C. W. REYNELL, LITTLE PULTENEY STREET,
BAYMARKET.
�A CROYDON EPISODE.
------ »—
T may be interesting to you if I recount the
origin of the Religious Society whose fifth
anniversary we celebrate to-day.
You will be surprised when I tell you that Croydon
occurred to me as the possible scene of my future
life whilst I was still a Roman Catholic ecclesiastic.
I did not know a single individual in this locality,
with the exception of the lately-deceased Congregationalist Minister, the Rev. Joseph Whiting. When
I was in office at Woodchester, in Gloucestershire,
he was Minister at Stroud. We became acquainted in
consequence of his expressing a desire to confer with
me on religious matters in presence of a young lady
who had some idea of embracing the Roman Catholic
faith. In 1862, in the guest-room of the Dominican
Priory at Woodchester, the conference took place, and
lasted three hours ; it was conducted on both sides
with the most perfect temper, fairness, and courtesy.
Those who remember Mr. Whiting will easily under
stand that the violation of such virtues will not
have disfigured his side of the controversy. At that
time the Roman Catholic doctrine of Infallibility was
the twofold Infallibility of the Bible and of the
Church. Papal Supremacy was held, but Papal
Infallibility was not an article of Faith, except so far
as it might be supposed to flow out of the two other
dogmas.
I
�6
A Croydon Episode,
We took Bible Infallibility as the basis of agree
ment and argument.
I thought, and still think, that I had the best of
the argument; anyhow, so thought the young lady,
for the conference decided her to embrace the Roman
Catholic faith.
Given Bible Infallibility, and take for granted that
Jesus Christ founded a dogmatic sect and that it
exists, it would be less difficult to prove the Papal
than the Anglican or the Evangelical to be that sect.
Seven years passed by. During that period eccle
siastical duties had removed me from Gloucestershire
and carried me over many parts of England. The
great controversy regarding Infallibility arose within
the Roman Catholic Church—the controversy which
has shaken the German Church to its centre and lost
to it its most illustrious defenders. Many minds
became anxious, some determined not to investigate
or think, others were by circumstances almost
reluctantly compelled to investigate and think. I
was amongst the latter class: doubts arose, these were
again earnestly banished amidst unceasing work
in missions, in preaching, and in the confessional.
The doubts kept forcing themselves before my mind.
In accordance with the sad teaching of ecclesiastical
theology, I regarded these doubts, not as the noble
utterances of the intelligence, but as temptations to
be suppressed. I tried to remove them by reading,
by occupation, by prayer.
A confessor told me that my position was too
prominent, that it fostered pride, and hence came
these temptations. It often happens that those
accused of pride, are in fact but the victims of dis
appointment. What so sad as to give your mind
and energy to a service, and to begin to suspect that
the service is an illusion.
However, I asked to withdraw from all public
�A Croydon Episode.
7
offices, and I withdrew to a country village, during
two years, only leaving it when the calls of duty or
of friendship rendered absence imperative. I was
sickened by the spectacle of religion deforming
itself into a scheming Papal faction, headed in
England by a diplomatic and ambitious convert,
in Rome by a Pope who knew nothing, and by a
Cardinal who believed nothing—if the testimony of
intimates can be trusted.
Amidst peasants, and country scenes, and village
children, I strove to forget the present, and to fortify
my faith by the theologies of the past.
Many a long evening have I sat in my garden at
Bosworth, when the nightingale’s song was the only
voice to be heard, and prayed that I might die ere
the illusion had utterly passed away.
During that time I happened to have been at
Arundel Castle. It was perhaps the autumn of 1868,
on my way home to Leicestershire, a gentleman
entered the carriage at Red Hill. I did not recognise
him at first, but he reminded me of our interview
at Woodchester—it was Mr. Whiting. We did not
discuss theology : theology had become my enemy.
It was a beautiful autumn eyening; the valley of
Caterham and the pleasant white houses about looked
beautiful and cheering. Mr Whiting got out at
Croydon, telling me he had come to live there. I
remember wishing that I had never been bound to
impossible creeds, but could be free from the galling
yoke of a human authoritative belief, and able to
mingle as a man amongst my fellow men and not as
a priest amongst subjects.
It is one of the singular coincidences of life, that
in the year 1870, when I distinctly apprehended that
as soon as the time of deliberation arranged with
my confessor had terminated, I should probably be
compelled to say to myself that the faith had no
�8
A Croydon Episode.
basis, I happened to see in a Unitarian paper a
notice that a Free Christian Church might be
desirable in Croydon. The thought flashed through
my mind how pleasant it would be if there happened
to be in such a place a few earnest unfettered minds,
who would like to combine for worship and edifica
tion, if it were only in the parlour of one’s house. That
same year Mr. Martineau came to Bosworth to confer
with me. On the 9th of August, 1870, I left my
quiet country home and went to Birmingham.
With the exception of superiors at a distance, no
one knew when I left, for I loved the villagers and
they loved me, and I did not wish to give or to
receive the pain of parting ; so I walked through the
quiet straggling village on foot, passed the old church
and the little Roman Catholic school, listened for a
moment to the children’s morning hymn to our Lady,
and left the past for ever behind—the stately, not
unpoetic past 1 and it ranged itself amidst the grand
mythologies of the days of old; like the statue of a
goddess on the niche of a colonnade, you admire it
and you leave it behind. The road leads through
the images of gods and of heroes to the temple of
the Universal.
When-Mr. Martineau came to visit me, I told him
that there could be to me no half-way house; that
either the Roman Catholic Church was a religion or
a mythology; if it were proved to me to be a mytho
logy, it was because the Bible was mythological and
all orthodox Christianity mythological. I saw only
two alternatives, the Religion of Rome; or the
Religion of Nature, of the Soul, of the Universe—
either a Religion denouncing all, or a Religion
embracing all. If the Roman Catholic Church is
not the special Church of God, then, the whole of
humanity, must be my Church; either does Revela
tion speak through the Roman Catholic Church,
�A Croydon Episode.
g
or it speaks through all Religions, all Souls, all
Nature.
At length I arose from the limited into the univer
sal. To a stranger, it might have seemed like passing
from a great Church into a very small Sect. A great
Church may hold what is narrow and transitory, a
mere handful of men may hold what is all-embracing.
In former times, all knowledge of external things
was based on theory or on magic. Lord Bacon
arose, and taught that it must be based solely on
experimental knowledge; he did not pretend to have
acquired the knowledge, but he affirmed the true
principle—the principle is a universal one—but it is
called the Baconian, and for long it was only held by
a few—by a small school of thought. Three hundred
years have past, and that school of thought has con
quered the whole domain of science; we apply
similar principles to religion. Like Jesus Christ, we
appeal to the soul and to nature; we are a small
school of thought, we bear the apparent limitation of
a name; of a name representing at once a history
and a principle, but that principle is a universal one,
and in three hundred years and less, will doubtless
have possessed the whole domain of religion. A
time will come—you help to prepare the time—when
men will say, not “ God is in the Church,” but “ all
nature is full of God.” A time dawns, you invoke
its horizon, when all dogmatic Churches will have
passed away, and ranged themselves in the stately
mausoleum of the past.
When there will be juster views of God, and of
man in relation to God; when society will feel the
change in all its departments from state government
to domestic service; when every wrong will be
righting, every mischief removing, every mistake
correcting, every sorrow alleviating. When there will
be the worship of the absolute perfection, allegiance
�IO
A Croydon Episode.
to eternal law, loving fidelity to all humanity, the
development of the power of mind; then, in the
human hierarchy, we shall behold the true ascension
—saint, lover, hero, thinker. Then the sense ofthe divine, the infinite, and the immortal, born of
reverence, trust, affection, deep in the ineradicable
qualities of our being, will create a faith and a feeling
of divine truth, not faint in its glow, not damped by
misgiving, not dimmed by doubt, or tainted by
selfishness.
Then the intuition of God will be natural; the
perception of His laws intellectually certain. Such a
religion will be “broad as humanity, frank as truth,
stern as justice, loving as Christ.” Only a few as yet
adopt openly and religiously the extreme of our pro
tests, but I venture to say that Croydon is nobler,
purer, braver, more loving, more Christian to-day;
because the glow of humanity’s glorious future is
shining on the brows of a few.
Through the friendly offices of Mr. Martineau I
was made personally known to a very small handful
of Liberal thinkers in this neighbourhood. Two
gentlemen came over to Manchester to invite me to
this place. They found me in the midst of a com
mittee of gentlemen offering to me the beautiful
Upper Brook-street Church. I felt myself not ready
for work in a great city, and accepted the invitation
to a very small beginning in a locality which seemed
to me more like retirement than publicity. The
foundation and outline of my religious position were
clear to me; the details were not filled in. Every
thing around me seemed strange and new. I felt
like a boy beginning amongst men. A few of us
met for our first religious service on October 2,1870,
in the Nonconformist Chapel, London-road, lent to
us for a couple of months. It was the day observed
by Roman Catholics as “ Rosary Sunday.” On Sun
�A Croydon Episode.
11
day, December 11, 1870, we assembled for the first
time in this building. The purchase of the ground
on which it stands was only completed on June 12 of
the present year, when we celebrated the occasion
by a numerous, distinguished, but private, social
gathering. We commenced with about eight adhe
rents—three or four soon seceded from our infant
cause, though continuing personal friends up to the
present moment; they would have continued with us
if we had adopted a line of action which never for a
moment approved itself to our intelligence or our
aspirations. Though we have lost nineteen by death,
we have gradually grown into a congregation, into a
testimony, into an influence, more than local.
As a congregation we are entirely independent, but
we find ourselves in sympathy of opinion and funda
mental principle with many congregations which, in
our own country and in various parts of Europe and
America, under the name of Unitarian, Free Chris
tian, Liberal Christian, Liberal Protestant, Theistic,
and other titles, proclaim the supremacy of reason and
conscience, and yet maintain themselves in the line of
historic religious development. We are in religious
sympathy with all who anywhere trust in God; we
are in moral sympathy with all who anywhere strive
to learn and to realise in act the moral laws existing
behind the visible; we are in human sympathy with
all men everywhere; we are in spiritual sympathy
with all Nature, for all Nature is full of God, though
Nature is not God, but the garment of God.
Although we possess our congregational govern
ment, committee, and officers, our classes for the
young, our library, our means for intelligent discus
sion and kindly intercourse, we, in accordance with
our principle of individualism in collective humanity,
throw ourselves into the general human and civic
life in matters charitable, political, recreative, literary,
�12
A Croydon Episode.
educational, local, national. In all these interests we
find ourselves continually meeting, not necessarily to
agree with one another as a clique having small
sectional sympathies, but cordially and heartily
entering as individuals into the general interests.
Humanity is our church, and wherever we find men
we find the members of our church. This religious
society is'like a spiritual sub-committee to help on
the general religious and moral interests of the great
fraternity of humanity.
As a religious society, in this town, we are only
five years old; but our sympathies have been sought
and imparted here and there widely over the
country in many places. We have been asked to
assist in the government of the associations which
concern themselves with the interests of all those
liberal churches which seek sympathy, help, or
encouragement. We have specially helped to found a
society in London, wherein all the sections of liberal
religious thought find a social bond. Such facts as
these prove that our religious position is not one of
isolation and eccentricity, but in harmony with the
higher religious thought of our country. I say “ we”
when I speak not merely of what you have directly
conducted and presided over, but as regarding what
has fallen to my lot to do; for such has been accom
plished in consequence of your co-operation and
sympathy. I am almost ashamed to own to the
extent of the injury received into the life of a sincere
and consistent Roman Catholic. Actual faults in the
ordinary sense of the word may be very few; he may
obtain any amount of patience, gentleness, purity, sub*mission, passive resistance, and power of endurance.
But the power of self-help out of prescribed limits
is perceptibly crippled. The Roman Catholic system
is unceasingly occupied with seeking consolation and
imparting it. Affectionate sympathy is encouraged
�A Croydon Episode.
I3
till it becomes at once a weakness and a necessity.
Jesus the Man of Sorrows, Christ the Consoler, the
Mater Dolorosa, and the Virgin Mother are fit symbols
of a system which promotes tenderness and depreciates
self-reliance. The more that a Roman Catholic
realises his religion, so much the more does the
conception of life become dreary; it is a vale of
tears; the sweet sunshine cannot be trusted; the
loveliness of the landscape is a delusion; the con
science has only two offices, i.e., to obey and to repress.
Thus I was almost of necessity compelled to supple
ment myself with your corporate action. As Froth
ingham in another place says, the Old Faith came as
a comforter, our New Faith comes as an inspirer, with
industry, philosophy, art, literature, with all the
regenerating thoughts of humanity, with all the
vigour and vitality of the creative ; the old songs of
Faith have to be sung with the accompaniment of all
human interests; our New Faith dreads inaction,
lassitude, melancholy; it brings a brighter view of life
and of man, a higher conception of God, a nobler ideal
of the future, as progress out of imperfectness. The
Roman Catholic Church presents to the votary Jesus
stripped and scourged, weeping, downcast, and con
templative ; our New Faith presents Jesus as the friend
and companion of men and of sinners, the manly, out
spoken reformer, the earnest enthusiast in the cause
of humanity, the foe of cant and of hypocrisy, the
unmasker of shams, the hero who could stand alone
and do battle for the true, the righteous, and the just.
The Old Faith wailed out its litanies of servile suppli
cation; the New Faith, brave, cheerful, thoughtful,
hopeful of the future because it remembers the past,
likes senfimeni in poetry, but in religion above all
things intelligence and reality. The Old Faith ap
pealed to prophecy, to miracles, to authoritative
books and authoritative churches; the New Faith.
�14
A Croydon Episode.
appeals to the prophetic instincts of the human soul,
to the miracle of the universe, to every noble and
righteous utterance which the human reason or
human conscience has ever recognised as religious,
inspiring, and good. The New Faith has not to
defend itself against history, science, and philosophy,
they are its natural allies. The New Faith has not
to condemn humanity, for it is the expression of
humanity in its highest, most thoughtful, and noblest
mood. The New Faith does not go about cautiously
and girt with a panoply of defence ; it can afford to
lay aside its armour, to throw its weapons down, to
go forth with upright confidence, and consort peace
fully with thoughtful people, feeling secure in the
honest sympathy of all intelligent, sincere, earnest,
and liberal men. The Old Faith had creeds received
upon authority; the New Faith goes forth with con
victions profound, because they have been forged in
the fiery furnace of the heart, and approved by the
science, by the reason, by the conscience, by the
intuitions of mankind.
Accustomed as I had been to the simple-hearted,
straightforward honesty of the Old English Roman
Catholics, accustomed as I had been to admire similar
characteristics amongst Unitarians, nothing shocked
me so much at the very beginning of my new life, and
since, as the discovery that such honesty was not
deemed by all a virtue, but rather a reproach. I found
in London and elsewhere fathers disbelieving the
popular mythology, and yet rearing their children to
its practice. I found here and there persons profes
sing our religious opinions, yet too indolent, or too
cowardly, or too inconstant to testify to them. I had
no sooner left the Roman Catholic Church because I
could not accept its creeds (they had disappeared in
the quicksands on which rested their foundations),
but I was solicited to embrace the very same creeds
�A Croydon Episode.
15
and liturgy in the Church of England; and, to my
amazement and indignation, the very persons who
urged upon me that unrighteous suggestion did not
accept those creeds and litanies in any ordinary use
of language, but only by ’some quibble of speech such
as I had always spurned when to a slighter degree
(according to popular rumour) permitted by the
Jesuits. I realised more than ever the necessity of
above all things, sincerity. If I reject hell as an
impiety, I cannot belong to a Church which declares
that persons who disbelieve the Trinity and the
Incarnation must go into hell’s everlasting fires.
Veracity is essential to true piety; veracity is founded
on faith in man. You tell a man the truth when yon
can trust him with it, and are not afraid. As Pro
fessor Clifford says, it is not English to tell a man
a lie, or to suggest a lie by your silence or by your
actions because you are afraid he is not prepared for
the truth, because you do not quite know what he
will do when he knows it, because perhaps after all
this lie is a better thing for him than the truth would
be. Surely this craven crookedness should be the
object of our detestation. Yet do I often hear it whis
pered that it would be dangerous to divulge certain
truths to the masses. I know the thing is untrue ;
but in a certain sense, after a fashion, it may be made
to be considered true; anyhow it is picturesque, con
soling, and useful for children, for women, for common
people. “ Crooked ways are none the less crooked
because they are meant to deceive a great many. If
a thing is true, let us all believe it: rich and poor—
men, women, and children. If a thing is untrue, let
us all disbelieve it: rich and poor—men, women, and
children. Truth is a thing to be shouted from the
house-tops, not to be whispered after dinner, over
rose-water, when the ladies are gone away.” Life
must first of all be made straight and true; falsehood
�16
A Croydon Episode.
can never be necessary to morality or to true piety. <l It
cannot be true of our neighbours, or of their children,
that to keep them from becoming scoundrels they
must believe a lie, or make, pretence to believe it.”
The sense of right and wrong—piety to God and
piety to man—such truths are too real to need the
doubtful help of insincerities and of mystification.
Thus, whatever errors we unhappily make, we will
at least be truthful, and not mystify away that human
trust without which society would be an impossibility,
business a fraud, the family a cabal—each individual
man, woman, and child a hypocrite or an imbecile.
EBINTED BY 0. W. BEYNELL, LITTLE PULTENEY STBEET, HAYMARKET.
�
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Victorian Blogging
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A Croydon episode
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Suffield, Robert Rodolph
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Place of publication: [Croydon?]
Collation: 16 p. ; 18 cm.
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1876
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Unitarianism
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Conway Tracts
Unitarianism
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Text
FREE THOUGHT
IN
RELIGION:
A LECTURE,
Delivered at GEORGE’S MEETING, EXETER,
March 1st, 1875,
J3y JRobe^t JRodolph JSuffield,
Member of the Free Christian Church, Wellesley Road, Croydon ; formerly
Apostolic Missionary and Prefect of the “Guard of Honour.”
DEVON
WEEKLY
TIMES,”
1875.
exeteB.
��THE REV. RODOLPH SUFFIELD ON
"FREE THOUGHT IN RELIGION.”
The Rev. Rodolph Suffield, now Unitarian Minister at
Croydon, but formerly a Roman Catholic Priest, paid a visit
to Exeter in the latter part of February. His transition from
the oldest form of orthodoxy to the newest phase of free
thought in religion was in itself a circumstance sufficient to
create much interest in him ; and the announcement that he
was to preach at George’s Chapel, therefore, attracted large
congregations. Those who heard the reverend gentleman were
much struck by his eloquence and power of argument. On the
following Monday evening (March 1st) a social gathering was
held in the schoolroom, for the purpose of giving the members
of the congregation an opportunity of making a more intimate
acquaintance with their visitor. Lady Bowring, whose guest
Mr. Suffield was daring his stay in Exeter, was among
those present. At half-past seven the company adjourned to
the chapel, for the purpose of listening to an address from the
reverend gentleman. The chair was taken by Mr. Henry
Norrington, J.P., and among those present were the Rev.
Rodolph Suffield, Rev. T. W. Chignell (minister at George’s
Chapel), Mr. W. Mortimer, J.P., Mr. Mears, &c. The chapel
was well filled.
Mr. Suffield, who on rising was very warmly received, said
it had been a great pleasure to him to visit this ancient city.
He had visited it on former occasions, and examined some of
the antiquities in the neighbourhood. He now visited Exeter
under other circumstances, and found himself amongst a band
of sincere and ardent men and women, who were not exactly,
perhaps, disciples of antiquity. They were the disciples rather
of progress than of antiquity, and yet he thought he might
claim for them that they were also disciples of antiquity in the
one high, great, and true sense. (Hear.) But of that
presently. Let him first thank them for their personal kind
ness. Perhaps he might also be permitted to pay a passing
tribute of affectionate reverence, which seemed trebly due, in
�4
coming to Exeter, to the memory of his and their honoured
friend, Sir John Bowring. (Cheers.) It was with almost
pathetic interest that he found himself the guest of his widow
at a time when he came to visit the place where Sir John last
resided. He remembered that the very last communication he
had from him was written from Exeter, and sadly it was'that
he went to fill up the gap left void by his death—if anyone
could be supposed to fill it up—at a place where they were
ardently longing to see him, but were disappointed, the hand of
Divine Providence having directed him to another and an
unknown land. Thus in different ways he felt as if there was
to him a kind of pathetic interest in thus being interwoven
with them, and with his memory, and the memory of the
intercourse with those whom he left behind. But to pass from
subjects of a personal character, he asked himself what exactly
it was which he ought to say on an occasion when nothing very
express had been laid out. It seemed a kind of presumption,
especially after having addressed them in the ordinary sacred
services of religion, again to address them upon those subjects
unless he had been somewhat directly asked to do so. He
hoped, however, that they would regard any words which he
might utter as simply the expression of thoughts, not indeed
in any way prepared, except in so far that they had been the
result of very strong, deep, and long-continued previous
thoughts, though not directly with a view to that evening.
Perhaps he should best carry out their wishes by answering a
question which was very often put to persons in their position.
When anyone heard discourses such as frequently might be
heard in the places of worship belonging to Religious Free
Thought, persons accustomed to the Orthodox views frequently
would observe :—“ You obviously don’t believe in the miraculous
authority of any Church, of any book, or of any man. Con
sidering what you ‘have rejected, tell us what remains.”
He certainly felt additional diffidence in even attempting to
propound an answer, however imperfect, to that question ; for
there was a voice much more familiar to them than his, which
was continually addressing them in that place. When they had
in the midst of them a man of the richest culture and deepest
thought, and the most ardent devotion to a great cause, they
hardly needed the voice of any stranger, and in fact a*ny other
voice must be feeble in comparison with that. It was a proud
thing for Exeter that they possessed in the midst of them a
man like Mr. Chignell—(cheers)—and it would be a proud thing
for the assemblies of Religious Free Thought in London if they
were able to number him amongst their ranks. (Hear, hear.) Thus,
he could only say from his own line of thought and stand-point
�5
something of the kind of reply that occurred to his own mind.
Doubtless the subject was one of stupendous importance. They
stood amidst the remnants of magnificent systems. He could
hardly conceive any man of thought, deep feeling, and high
culture, who could possibly look without emotion on the great
Churches surrounding them. There was the venerable Church
of Rome, with its stately history, its gorgeous traditions, its
rich fund of sanctity, its realms of poetry and beauty, and
with everything almost that could mark what was past in stately
grandeur, and in so much of grace and excellence the perfectness
of the spiritual life. He should be sorry indeed to fling a
stone of scorn at the Roman Catholic Church, so venerable in
its august traditions, so vast in its former influence upon the
world, frequently for good. Again, there was the illustrious
Church of England, interwoven with the religious liberties of
the nation, and with her highest culture. There was hardly a
single epoch of modern English history, there was hardly an
illustrious name, but what was in some way interwoven either
with the Protestant Church of England or with those illustrious
Nonconformist bodies (he spoke of the Orthodox Nonconformist
bodies) which had been the bulwarks of religion, and to a great
degree of religious free thought, at least in the seeds they had
been sowing. (Applause.) Indeed, that man must be in
different to whatever was grand in human thought and history
who could not look with respect, nay affection, upon each one in
succession of these grand organisations. He confessed that to
his own mind the sensation of scorn or hatred seemed simply an
impossibility. (Cheers.) Each one of these great organisations
seemed to him io represent something which the human mind
had coveted, some great principle which the human heart had had
to uphold. (Cheers.) Then what was the fatal flaw belonging to
them all ? It was simply this, that they rested on a foundation
of mist; they were beautiful edifices, built on a golden cloud,
and the only question was whether, having discovered this, they
were to carry on the illusion simply because they thought it
might do good, or whether, trusting to God, and to Divine
truth, they were distinctly to say, “These things are not true.”
There was in them much of beauty and grandeur; they had
done much in their day ; but all such things might have been said
of Paganism, and yet it rested on a mist. Paganism was a grand
religion, parent of almost everything that was glorious in poetry
and in art. Everything of the majestic in human history was to
be found in Greek Paganism. They wandered amid the relics
of its grandeur, and they felt as if they could almost bow down
and worship before those magnificent creations of the human
intellect, some of them almost bordering on the Divine. And
�6
yet it was not right to maintain that stately old Pagan
ism, when it was found out that it rested on what was
not true. (Hear, hear.) And so with other systems since.
Then, again, it could not be right to say, “ Such a system is
very vast; and on account of the hold it possesses over so many
millions of people, therefore you ought not in any way to point
out the error; rather you ought to submit to it, and accept it
as true for the sake of the millions who hold to it.” He need
not remind them that there was a religion, most ancient and
most vast, which embraced a third of the human race;
more ancient than the most ancient forms of Christianity
—a religion before whose august traditions and organiza
tions much in Christendom must pale away into insignifi
cance—the vast and wonderful religion of Buddha. That
religion sprang from, and was itself a reform of, another
religion still more ancient, viz., the Brahminical religion,
with its Incarnate Deities. That carried them back to a period
when they were absolutely lost in the very depths of a history
so ancient, so vast that they could hardly fathom it at all. Were
they to submit to this, if they lived in the East, because it had
done so much good and contained so many beautiful things, as
the Buddhist religion undoubtedly did ? The great precepts
of Charity, which formed the glory of Christianity, would be
found—and no man knew it better than their venerable friend,
Sir John Bowring—existing in the most perfect beauty in the
sacred books of Buddha. The most delicate exercises of the '
precepts of Charity were therein pointed out; even that exercise
of Charity which consisted in erecting fountains, not merely for
man, but for the beasts of the field, so that it was even said, if
you would be the favoured child of the Most Holy One,
erect watering troughs in the most sequestered roads, where the
traveller’s horse may be satiated in the midst of the burning
heat, and no one shall know whence the mercy to that beast has
come. Surely a religion which was able to utter such precepts
as that ages before the dawn of Christianity, was not a religion
that could be treated as if it were nothing. (Hear, hear.) They
could not, however, admit for a moment the principle that a
religion was to be treated as true, simply because it contained
beautiful, true, sublime, and spiritual precepts. The fact was,
there was no religion in the world which did not contain that
which was of the essence of religion. Then, were they to accept
the particular form of error of the country in which they were
born—Buddhism and Brahminism in Hindustan, Roman
Catholicism in Italy, Protestantism in England, and the religion
of Mahomet in Turkey—upon the ground that they all accepted
and taught the fundamental principles of all religion ? The
�7
reply to that was that religion was one thing and morality
another. There was one great principle of morality entirely
essential for human life and the formation of character, viz., the
principle of individual truthfulness. It was not possible for
any man of ordinary intelligence and diffidence to say that he
had got the truth and all who disagreed with him were wrong.
All he could say was that such and such were his convictions of
the truth, and of course he should change them if he saw
reasons for doing so. They might differ in their convictions,
but they would all agree that each man must be true to his
own convictions. This was the fatal obstacle which stood in
the way of any person professing to conform to any of the
Orthodox religions. He could not do so and at the same time
observe perfect and entire truthfulness—he was obliged to keep
something back. For instance, a clergyman who had studied
the works of that great geologist, who on Saturday was interred
in Westminster Abbey, or had studied something of geology
for himself, knew that the world had been in existence for ages,
and that the Creation was not sudden, but a gradual and con
tinual evolution. Yet he had to say every Sunday that God
created the earth and the heavens in six days and rested on the
seventh, which was in dead contradiction to everything taught
by the Revelation of the Rocks. Every person who read that
commandment about the Sabbath day had to deny distinctly
the Revelation of God, contained, not in one single book, but in
every rock. A schoolboy, if he had the moral courage, might
stand up and say, “ If you please, reverend sir, that is not
true—God did no such thing, and I know better.” (Hear.)
It struck him that for a person to be in the position that he had
to be the docile recipient of a single untruth which he knew to
be untrue, was absolutely bad for the moral character. (Hear.)
Of course, there were many persons who did not know these
things to be untrue, and then it was all right. If a person
really believed a thing, however untrue in fact it might be, there
was no lowering of the moral character. What he protested was
this—that as soon as ever a person recognised that there was
that in Orthodoxy which was not true, he could not profess to
recognise it as true without a distinct lowering of the
moral character. That was the cause of their position.
That was the cause of their uniting together and saying—We
will be quite free ; we will place ourselves in the hands of Divine
Providence ; we will not fetter ourselves or our minister in any
manner ; whatever science teaches, let it teach, let history un
ravel what it may. Whatever there is grand and beautiful in
any religion, tell us all—it does not belong to that religion, it
belongs to humanity and God ; and that is the reason we can
�speak well of the Roman Catholic, the Mahomedan, the Brahmin,
the Buddhist, the Anglican, and the Wesleyan Churches.
Excuse the putting of these together; some were very
great and some very small, some very new and some
very ancient, but they all represented different phases
of humanity ; and those who were in the position of
Religious Free Thought could say, “ You are all our brothers
and sisters, for you all make a portion of that great humanity to
which we ourselves belong.” (Hear, hear.) He hoped that if
there were any Orthodox friends present, they would do him
the kindness to understand that while he was bound to say out
what he thought, he did not mean it as the expression of con
tempt in any shape or form. That he said with perfect sincerity;
and, having said that, they would kindly permit him to speak as
things occurred to his own mind, because, if one spoke under the
perpetual feeling that he might give persons pain, one could not
say out what he thought. (Hear, hear.) They would perceive,
then, that the position he took was that all the different religions
were untrue, being all without exception interwoven with super
stition. There were legends and incarnations in most of them.
The Pagan gods had children by human mothers ; and hundreds
of years before Christ there was the Indian legend of Chrisna,
bom of a virgin, with God as his father, who had to fly to a
foreign country, was reared among peasants, and was worshipped
by shepherds. The legends were very similar in the different
religions. There were miracles, too, in all of them ; equally
false and equally true. There were miracles going on now just
as in former times, and he could quite understand how they
grew up without any intention to deceive on the part of those
who promulgated them. These legends and miracles were all
based upon truth ; they were simply exaggerations. Human
credulity had coloured little incidents of truth, and had kept
looking at them until they were magnified and multiplied
immensely. The difficulty of getting at human evidence was
extraordinary, as was exemplified in the late Tichbome trial—
if they would pardon the allusion. Take any miracle, or any
statement of any religion in the world, and let an English
jury and counsel sit upon it, and where would it be ? He
(Mr. Suffield) felt that in rejecting one mythological sys
tem, he rejected them all. It was with great pain and regret
that he did so, but he could not place himself in the position of
rejecting one system, with which he was interwoven by many
tender and reverent memories, and which had given him no
cause to sever himself from it, except the one great fact, that
he was profoundly convinced it was not true—he felt it
impossible that he could reject one mythological system, and
�9
then embrace another and fancy it true. He felt himself amid
the ruins of many stately, poetic, and beautiful mythologies,
relics of an age that had passed away, and the question he had
to put to himself was this—“ If I rise out of this, what will be
my spiritual position ? On what can I form my life ? What
can I present to others as the mode of forming their lives ?”
Here he might say—and he had never mentioned it in public
before—that when he was on the point of leaving the Roman
Catholic Church, a deeply loved and honoured friend, with
whom he had spent years of intimate and tender friendship,
wrote to him and signified that he and some others had
determined to present him with an income of above .£200 a
year, to enable him to retire into literary ease, without
doing anything contrary to his conscience, and be thus
free from anxiety and care. It was done in a way which
signified every gentle and tender feeling ; but he felt bound to
decline the offer. He knew the alternative which presented
itself, but he determined that if he left the Roman Catholic
Church, thopgh he had no intention of attacking it, he would
publicly maintain the position which he deemed to be the right
and truthful position for every human being; and he could not
do so if he accepted that offer. (Hear, hear.) Thus they
perceived that what he was saying represented something which
had been deeply and profoundly before his own mind. “ Then,”
he asked himself, “What is the position before me?” and the
answer was simply this : “ I fall back upon the intuitions of
my own soul, and upon my own reason as the guide presiding
over those intuitions.” Would they bear with him while he
explained a little more fully what he meant ? What was it
which a person, any person whatever, instantly appealed to
when called upon to any action? Suppose they belonged to
any of the Churches of Christendom, and suppose some
temptation suddenly presented itself to them. He would
suppose it was a temptation to commit a fraud—a fraud upon a
benefactor. What was it that immediately made a man say,
‘ ‘ No, I will not do that ?” Was it the teaching of any creed ?
Was it a precept contained in any sacred book ? No. Before
they had thought of any written precept, or remembered the
utterance of any Church, there was that inner voice, that sense
of right and wrong, which instantly made a man say to himself,
if he was good or wishing to be good, “ I will not do it—I
cannot do it—it is not right.” Now, it was a platitude of
platitudes to say that; and yet it was the most important
principle of their philosophy to point it out, because what he
affirmed was this—that if in the great incidents of human life,
just the very occurrences when they needed a guide, if then
�10
the guide they went to was within them, then was it not true
that in reality nothing higher was needed ? And then a person
might say, “ Ah, that is Very true, but we meet it by this
objection. There would be many cases in which you would not
know how to act; and therefore you must go to the Bible to
learn how to act.” His reply to that was that the person who
took the Bible as his infallible guide—if he was what they
called a common-sense person, leading an ordinary life of
goodness and common-sense—that person invariably inter
preted the Bible by the principle of conscience. For instance,
they knew the beautiful Sermon on the Mount. Suppose a
clergyman had solemnly read in Church the words about giving
the coat to him who would take the cloak. Suppose you went
out of doors after hearing this solemnly read ; and suppose a
beggar came up and asked for something. You were a very
orthodox lady perhaps ; but you would immediately say, “ I
don’t give to beggars in the street.” (Laughter.) “ But,”
says the beggar, “please, your ladyship, it says in the Gospel
that you are to give to whoever asksand then he asks a
gentleman standing by for his coat, and he gets it, and the coat
too. Immediately the man pawns the things, and spends the
money in making himself drunk. They would say immediately,
“ That isn’t rational, it isn’t right.” How did they know it
was not rational ? The voice within said so. And every
rational person, leading any ordinary life, when he took the
Bible as his infallible guide, was invariably guided by this
higher principle within—the principle of conscience. (Hear.)
Then, he held that there was a moral guide within man, and
that was the first and most important principle. He was perfectly
aware that he should be met by the observation again and
again, “ But this varies—there are a great number of different
views regarding it.” So there were. Amongst people who
took infallible authorities there were a great many different
views; but the essential principles of right were the same.
What he claimed was that every man had this gift of dis
cerning right from wrong within him. There might be distorted
cases, just as there were persons born without eyes or nose;
or a man might possibly destroy the gift, as he might poke
out his eyes. But still the fact remained, that, ordinarily
speaking, every person had within him the sense of right and
wrong. They hardly ever found it get out of the character.
He had intimately known prisoners of all sorts, some of them
belonging to the most degraded criminal classes, and he must
say he could not call to mind one single instance of any human
being having totally lost all moral sense. He had known
persons in a sophistical state of mind who had argued against
�11
what he said, but as soon as they were not arguing they had
got it like other people. (A laugh.) He had not known one
single instance of a human being who had not within him that
sense of what they called right and wrong, a sense of duty
to be done; and duty implied duty to Someone—it was duty
to a Mind that was above man. That, he held, was universal,
and the few exceptions only proved the universality of the rule.
Thus they had got in that principle of right and wrong, every
thing that was needed for the practical purposes of life, if the
principle were developed and not crushed. Roman Catholic
friends would pardon his remarking that one of the most fatal
things in their Church was the tendency, which had been
growing upon it in late years, to crush the sense of the
individual conscience before the will of another man. That was
a very perilous experiment. (Hear.) What he said, therefore,
was this—that there exists in every human being the sense of
right and wrong ; that thus they had a practical guide for all
the purposes of life, and that thus they had the means presented
them of considering how to live themselves and of teaching
others how to live. Let them apply the test of the bringing up
of children, which was the great test of whether or no any
religious or moral system was correct. Now what was the
highest mode of bringing up a child 1 Surely it was not that
which would crush his intelligence, his sense of right and wrong,
and train it all into the practice of one single feature, which
might be a virtue and often might not be—simple submission
to another person, or submission to a dead book. Orthodox
Protestants had no right to triumph over Roman Catholics for
their belief in'the Pope’s infallibility ; because he must be
allowed to say that, between the two infallibilities, he hardly
knew which was the more absurd. The religious Rationalist, in
bringing up his children, assumed that there existed within
them the sense of right and wrong and the principle of
reason. He did not crush these, but developed them,
instructing them with the knowledge he had himself
received, so that the child of the nineteenth century
was bom and brought forward into the world with the
advantages of all the ages that had preceded him. He could
conceive of nothing so cruel as a religious free thinker, a
Unitarian, allowing his children to grow up anyhow, so that they
might be utterly uninfluenced in their choice. The principle of
conscience compelled him to give to his child the highest
advantages, the highest stand-point, which he had painfully
conquered for himself. (Hear, hear.) He would present to his
child the highest experience of the moral conscience around
him j he would train the child so that he would grow up with a
�12
strong sense of the duty he owed to the Universe of which he
was a part. That was something they could teach to the
youngest child. He took this line of putting it, because it
tested at once whether it was the true position or not. Take
the youngest child, then ; and how easy it was for them to
present to him the idea of God ! Ah, far easier than for any
person fettered by the Churches. What a dismal, painful, and
difficult thing it was for them to have to teach a child about the
Orthodox God. The Orthodox person had to tell his child that
there was a time when the God of the Universe could sit at
supper and eat with Abraham and his wife ; that He could ask
Abraham’s opinion as to what He should do with the cities of
the Plain, and then, not satisfied with Abraham’s judgment in
the matter, could send out two angels to examine the place and
sit down to supper until they returned. How could they
consistently make children reverent about the great God of the
Universe when they had to make them understand this was He?
Then the Orthodox parent had to teach his child the doctrine of
the Trinity, and to assure him that if he did not believe that
entirely he would be consigned to everlasting fire, and that he
would find the greatest portion of the world there.
And yet
the God who did this was a Being full of benevolence and love,
and the child must love him with all his heart and soul. What
a monstrous collection of contradictions! The Orthodox parent
had also to teach his child to believe in a Saviour. “ A Saviour !
to save me from what 1 ” the child would naturally ask. “ Oh,
to save you from God, to s.ave you from your Heavenly Father 1”
The Free Thinker had risen to a higher platform than that. He
said, “I don’t want a Saviour to save me from God. God is my
Saviour. God is my everlasting refuge, my everlasting hope. I
want no Saviour to save me out of the hands of the omnipotent,
eternal, and all-beautiful God.” Then, having dismissed these
mythological fables, how easy his task was. If the child asked
any question about God—what He is like> where He is—he at
once said : “I don’t know, I can’t explain anything. I don’t
understand it at all. I cannot tell you what that is within you
which thinks and feels, and which you call mind. I cannot
even tell you what my own mind is—I don’t know its essence,
or its form ; I don’t know where it is, whether diffused over
my body or dwelling in a particular place. I don’t know any
thing at all about it. I simply know there is something called
the mind, something which makes the ‘ I,’ something which is
subject to all these thoughts and feelings and emotions, and I
call it my soul. My child (he would say), the great Universe
is not dead ; the great and beautiful Universe, it also has a
Soul. You are not superior to the Universe. You have a soul
�13
capable of emotion; the little body of yours is tenanted by that
soul. This glorious and magnificent universe, too, this also has
a Soul. Such as your soul is to your body, such is the Soul of
the great and wonderful Universe to the Universe itself. The
Soul of the Universe, my child, we call it ‘ God,’—the beautiful,
the all-good, the all-just, the all-wonderful God. More than
that, my child, I cannot tell you. But I can tell you, He is good,
because you feel, and know yourself, that it is not badness and
folly that are ruling this world. That Soul of the world, which
we call God, you feel and know He must be wisdom and good
ness.” He ventured to say that everybody present was con
vinced that any child in the world, addressed in such words, had
that within him whereby he would be able to recognise this
truth from his earliest age ; and the recognition would intensify
more and more the longer he lived. Their religion, then, was
very simple. He would ask them to bear with him a moment.
There was one other great truth which he should be sorry to
have forgotten. He must confess that if he stopped where he
had just brought them, the world would still be a dismal world.
The most dismal of all dismal things would be the state
of a man in this Universe without the sense of God.
That would be terrible and sad indeed. It would seem
to him as if the whole world were like a lonesome
desert. Having presented to the mind of the child
this first great thought— God, the Soul of the Universe,
they then had to teach him that there was a relationship be
tween that Soul of the Universe and the soul of man. And this
could be taught without the assistance of the Churches and
Scriptures. It could be taught by the aid of the book which
God himself had planted in the soul. He did not believe the
soul was created corrupt and loathsome, and he did not believe
any Orthodox parent believed it in bis heart. What was it that
made life beautiful but sympathy between soul and soul—that
consciousness of the reciprocation of sympathy which they called
the communion of souls ? This was one of the glories, one of
the beauties, of Humanity. It could not be taken away—it was
engrafted in the great heart of mankind. As soon as a child
recognised that, he recognised also that there must be a com
munion between the great Soul of the Universe and the souls
of men. Was that great Soul, which had flung itself forth into
all the forms of beauty, gentleness, majesty, and tenderness—
was that Soul alone without human sympathy ? Was that Soul
alone incapable of communion ? They had to annihilate their
very nature before they could think it. (Applause.) Thus the
next religious lesson was this. They easily pointed out to a
child, not by complicated texts, but by appealing to that which
�was purest and best within him—that there must be communion
between his soul and God, because it was exactly that which
was the beauty and life of all souls everywhere ; and what the
child felt towards any good man, what they felt towards one
another, that in an infinite extent the great Mind of the
Universe must feel towards them. (Applause.) He had said
thus much in order to show the simplicity and solidity of their
religious position. The Orthodox might urge that it was
insecure, inasmuch as it rested, after all, upon the intuitions of
the individual. But what did anything in orthodox religion
rest upon, in the case of an intelligent person who had thought
out his religion for himself ? He was not so presumptuous as to
suppose that no intelligent man would reason himself into a
belief in one of the Orthodox religions. Having done so, he
said, “ I have a solid rock ; you have not. You rest upon
conscience and intelligence, but I rest upon the infallible
authority of my Bible or my Church.” After all, that was an
error ; because his infallibility rested purely and simply upon a
whole collection of arguments. And here was the marvellous
power of their position, not as a controversial position, which he
cared nothing for, but its marvellous power for the future of the
human race. The intelligent and thoughtful Orthodox person
rested his whole spiritual life on a collection of the most com
plicated arguments—he ought to go through centuries of history
and examine the original Hebrew and Greek scriptures, though
unfortunately there were no originals. The Orthodox parent
ought to go into all this, and then launch his child forth into
life, fortified with the complication of proofs. That was why
Orthodox people were so anxious about dogmatic education,
and so afraid of science. Strong as the Orthodox imagined his
position to be, he was always in danger of finding an additional
argument which would undermine the fabric, and then the
whole thing passed away, carrying with it the whole moral and
spiritual life, unless, indeed, it had been built up on other
principles after all. He wished he could make them realise the
intense importance of this, and the miserable and terrible risk
there was in trusting the whole moral and spiritual life to an
infallibility resting upon such a complication of proofs. He
would frankly tell them one of the reasons why, though so out
spoken to them, he felt cautious regarding what was called
shaking the opinions of Orthodox persons—it was his knowledge
how tremendous was the danger on account of the fatal error
of Orthodox education. Therefore they saw what a vast
advantage they possessed, who, in the place of resting their
religion and morality upon complicated systems, were able to
take simply what came from God—Humanity, the Bible of God
�15
within and around them. (Hear, hear.) He had now almost
come to a close. He thanked them for the kindness with
which they had listened to what he felt were only the veriest
platitudes, but platitudes on which the whole of the human life
rested, It might, however, do some good to hear those
platitudes from other lips than those to which they had been \
accustomed ; for it was some testimony, at least, of the belief
of another mind in the vastly important position they main
tained. He must confess he did believe their position to be one
of vast importance. He looked with fear and trembling upon
the future of a country without religion, without the thought of
God, without trust, without hope in God. Such was the future
which Orthodoxy was preparing for them. He was intimate
with some persons in political life, defenders of the Established
Church, regular attendants at the services of that Church ; and
he found amongst them an entire shaking of all religious belief.
Since these persons had become cognisant of the progress of the
truths of Science, he had noticed that whenever they were in
circumstances in which they thought they could speak openly,
they admitted that it was utterly impossible to recognise as
true any of the dogmas of Orthodox Christianity. And yet such
persons were frequenters of the Church of England, and when
residing in the country built churches and attended Sacrament,
regularly. He knew many such persons. They had entirely
lost all sense of belief in God. Everything had passed away.
Not only had they lost their belief in God, but what, if he were
to make the comparison, was almost worse—their belief in man.
The two generally went together. When a man lost his sense
of a belief in God, very often there passed away also that
beautiful stay of humanity—belief in man. (Hear, hear.) , The
two were interwoven. It rested with such as those he was
addressing to save the future of their country. Orthodoxy
could not save it. The old Roman Catholicism could not save
it. The days of Roman Catholicism were numbered, though
they might be long. It had had a gre'at history, but it must
rest on its past. It must either alter effectually, or die like the
great religions of old. It would leave behind it a great
memory, but, like other great things of old, it must perish.
All existing superstitions must pass away. Science was getting
stronger than all, and must eventually destroy all mythologies. .
And then it would be a question whether men and women—
earnest, moral, religious, spiritual—should have been the means
of keeping alive within the country the beginning of better and
higher influences ; whether the religious life, the spiritual life,
the sense of conscious communion between the soul and God,
the recognition of supreme intelligent law and a supreme Law
�16
giver, should have been fostered and kept alive among the
people. Oh, my friends, (the rev. gentleman exclaimed) it is
your great destiny, small in number as you may be, to strive to
keep alive these great principles, and foster them for the time
to come. It is a noble and a righteous undertaking, as I
ventured to say to you yesterday, to rival the faith of the men
of old, and to rival it. on the principles of intelligence and
human conscience. In different places and in different ways
may we labour for that great cause. It is surrounded with
difficulties, it is surrounded with misjudgment, it is embarrassed
with numerous complications, but it is a glorious cause. It is
the cause of the progress of human conscience and intelligence,
the communion of the soul of man with the Soul of the Universe
—a cause boundless as the Universe, a religion of no sect or
denomination, but embracing all and everywhere, a religion
planted in the soul and planted in the Universe. (Applause.)
Such was, I conceive, the idea which animated the heart of the
life of Jesus, that noble-hearted son of Joseph and Mary. His
lofty spiritual nature, his profoundly religious genius, soaring
above the narrow superstitions of His age, and of many ages,
beheld a religion varying in form, opinion, and mode, but in
its essence as universal as humanity. May we in our several
vocations and localities, perchance seldom meeting, combine in
sympathy, as we strive during the brief remnant of our life, to
build up and to develope that supreme idea. We, like Jesus,
would commend our soul to the Supreme Goodness; this
present life, and the life beyond the grave, we trust to Him,
the Eternal and the Wonderful God 1
God—onr God—whose works surroupd us,
Preaches in the summer wind,
In the tempest of the ocean,
In the silence of the mind,
In the sparkle of the planets,
In the splendour of the sun,
In the voice of all creation—
“ God is Love, and God is One.”
�
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Title
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Victorian Blogging
Description
An account of the resource
A collection of digitised nineteenth-century pamphlets from Conway Hall Library & Archives. This includes the Conway Tracts, Moncure Conway's personal pamphlet library; the Morris Tracts, donated to the library by Miss Morris in 1904; the National Secular Society's pamphlet library and others. The Conway Tracts were bound with additional ephemera, such as lecture programmes and handwritten notes.<br /><br />Please note that these digitised pamphlets have been edited to maximise the accuracy of the OCR, ensuring they are text searchable. If you would like to view un-edited, full-colour versions of any of our pamphlets, please email librarian@conwayhall.org.uk.<br /><br /><span><img src="http://www.heritagefund.org.uk/sites/default/files/media/attachments/TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" width="238" height="91" alt="TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" /></span>
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Conway Hall Library & Archives
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2018
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Conway Hall Ethical Society
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Pamphlet
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Free thought in religion: a lecture delivered at George's Meeting, Exeter, March 1st 1875
Creator
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Suffield, Robert Rodolph
Description
An account of the resource
Place of publication: Exeter
Collation: 16 p. ; 18 cm.
Notes: Part of Morris Miscellaneous Tracts 4.
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Devon Weekly Times
Date
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1875
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G4865
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Free thought
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<a href="http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/"><img src="http://i.creativecommons.org/p/mark/1.0/88x31.png" alt="Public Domain Mark" /></a><span> </span><br /><span>This work (Free thought in religion: a lecture delivered at George's Meeting, Exeter, March 1st 1875), identified by </span><a href="https://conwayhallcollections.omeka.net/items/show/www.conwayhall.org.uk"><span>Humanist Library and Archives</span></a><span>, is free of known copyright restrictions.</span>
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English
Free Thought
Morris Tracts
-
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df5aba88fc549cf1b5def8a739235154
PDF Text
Text
THE< RESURRECTION.
\
"4'’^
Jr (Sasier
. ,..
-«»
gtonxmg Snmwn;
AT THE
>
FREE CHRISTIAN CHURCH, CROYDON,
LONDON.
•-* '
*' v *
t.
•
'
.
’ \
BY THE
REV. ROBERT RODOLPH SUFFIELD.
PUBLISHED BY THOMAS SCOTT,
NO. 11, THE TERRACE, FARQUHAR ROAD,
UPPER NORWOOD, LONDON, S.E.
Price Threepence.
��THE RESURRECTION.
Did the Evangelists believe in the bodily resurrection
of Jesus ?
Undoubtedly. But they did not connect it,with
the immortality of the soul or with the conscious
ness of the soul after death; for they attribute to Jesus
the words to the dying thief, “ This day thou shalt be
with me in Paradise,” i.e., on Friday evening, on the day
of my death; and no one supposes the body of the
thief to have shared in the miraculous resurrection at
tributed to the body of Jesus. But as a miracle, un
doubtedly the first disciples believed it.
Did the Evangelists attach special importance to that
miracle 1
Obviously not: their transparent sincerity, their en
tire truthfulness surpassed even their credulity.
We have every reason for concluding the existing
Gospels to be compilations founded upon earlier records
which have perished. Biographies of uncertain author
ship, translated by unknown persons in a disputable
period—biographies not asserting either authorship, or
infallibility, or inspiration, handed down to us through
many varying MSS., cannot be allowed to settle ques
tions of fact, however precious they may justly be to us
as the earliest records of the origin of Christianity.
The very circumstances which exalt the truthful inten
tions of the authors, serve to weaken belief in the in
cidents recorded. The Evangelists agree in certain
general statements, though differing in important de
�4
The Resurrection.
tails j they agree in recording that the body of Jesus
was buried as soon as ever it had been taken down
from the Cross; that the body was privately interred
in a new grave erected in the secluded garden of a
friend ; that “before the break of day the body had dis
appeared ; that no one had witnessed the mode of its
disappearance, or could testify to anything but the fact
that, whereas the body had been laid in the cave serv- '
ing as a tomb, after a few hours it had disappeared,
nothing remaining excepting the winding sheets, folded
and placed on one side; Jesus was seen afterwards,
walking about the garden.
If the Disciples had anticipated the resurrection, and
attached importance to it, they would have taken some
means to secure knowledge of so interesting a prodigy,
whereas none of his apostles see the body of Jesus
buried, or appear at all at the tomb till it is empty.
Joseph of Arimathsea, Nicodemus, Mary Magdalene,
and Mary the mother of Joses, are alone cognisant of
any of the details as to his burial—alone present;
indeed, the gospel limits to the two women the behold
ing where the body of Jesus was laid. His mother
does not appear—only one female relative and one
female friend. But the gospel tells us that even they
left the tomb ; and from Friday evening until Sunday
morning no disciple is described as approaching the
grave. This was not the result of want of affection,
but in consequence of the strictness of the Judaic law
as to the Sabbath. The Paschal solemnities lasted
through an octave. On Thursday this octave had
commenced ; and, according to the first three Evan
gelists, Jesus celebrated the Paschal supper with his
disciples on Thursday evening, imitating the example
of all households. The author of the fourth gospel
contradicts their statements. He wrote many years
after, when a complicated theology had commenced,
and Jewish credulity wished to imagine that Jesus had
died on the day of the sacrifice of the Paschal lamb:
�The Resurrection.--
5
therefore he drops entirely all allusion to the last
supper, which has been called in later times the insti
tution of the Eucharist. The beauty and spirituality of
what is called John’s Gospel must not make us forget
that its lateness of date excuses its insuperable varia
tions as to facts ; and we must prefer the statement
of three books to that of one.
Thus Jesus followed the national custom and cele
brated the Paschal Supper on the usual evening with
his friends, using wine, according to the Rabbinical
practice; on Friday he was put to death—his burial
was hastened because the Saturday being the Sabbath
Day, the Jews, who had legally murdered Jesus, could
not be guilty of the greater crime of touching a dead
body on the Sabbath, and the Sabbath falling within
the octave of the passover was a great Sabbath. His
friends and relations dared not, therefore, offend the
popular prejudice or violate the sabbatical law by
walking on the Sabbath Day • and what would have
been worse, walking to visit a grave. But at the
earliest convenient hour after the close of the great
Sabbath • three women according to one Evangelist,
two according to another, Mary Magdalene alone ac
cording to another, went to visit the grave. The
Evangelists again disagree as to the details, whether two
angels or one appeared—whether the angelic vision
was within the tomb or outside ; whether the stone
was rolled away in presence of the women, or found
rolled away. But amidst these discrepancies, the
narratives agree in showing that no one whatsoever saw,
or professed to have seen, Jesus rise from the tomb.
If the disciples had anticipated the resurrection,
they would naturally have watched night and day
awaiting such a miracle; whereas the two women
came expecting to find the corpse of Jesus, and brought
sweet spices to anoint it, and their only anxiety was
how, on their arrival, they should open the stone gate
of the vault.
�6
The Resurrection.
So little importance had the Apostles attached to
certain figurative words attributed to Jesus, and sup
posed afterwards to have been prophetical of his
resurrection—that when the women go and tell them
that they met Jesus in the garden—that the tomb was
empty—they accuse the women of telling idle tales.
Peter hastening to the tomb, and finding it empty,
is at once satisfied. John follows and also sees the
sepulchre empty, and “he saw and he believed,”—
namely, he saw an empty grave and the winding sheet
lying folded up there. They saw nothing else—they
did not even see the angel or angels, but what they did
see they believed. Afterwards they and others are
described as having seen Jesus, and spoken and eaten
with him. The Evangelist tells us distinctly what
was the common opinion of the inhabitants up to the
time he wrote, viz., that the statement of the soldiers
was true, “ rhe disciples came by night and stole
away the body while we slept.”
Another rumour also existed, the origin of which we
recognise in the surprise of Pilate when Joseph of
Arimathsea asked for the body of Jesus; Pilate
“marvelled if he were already dead,” and sent and
asked the centurion whether he were really dead;
whereupon the governor, on his sole and friendly
testimony, permitted the Arimathaean to take the body.
A rumour spread that Jesus had not quite died on the
cross, but revived under the care of his mother, and
lingered on for some days amongst her friends, and
then sunk beneath his wounds and sufferings.
To meet that rumour, the author of the last Gospel
states that a soldier wounded the side of Jesus with
his lance, causing blood and water to flow, which the
writer unscientifically supposes to afford certain proof
of his death.
Generally when a criminal was crucified, the body
was fastened with ropes to the cross and allowed to
remain for weeks suspended till death ensued as the
�The Resurrection.
7
result of starvation and exposure. The Evangelists
tell us that an additional suffering was inflicted on
Jesus in the piercing his hands. The mental and
bodily torture thus endured by Jesus might be sup
posed likely to cause him at length to swoon away and
become insensible j but hanging thus on the cross for
a few hours would not in itself cause his death, al
though we know that sometimes men of fine organiza
tion and acute sensibility die under some sudden shock
of pain, of fear, or of grief.
As time advanced, belief in the bodily resurrection
of Jesus intensified, amongst Christians, though the
event obtained no credence amongst Jews, Romans, or
Greeks. But after all, the first witnesses can be alone
taken as the establishes of the fact. Some will deem
the evidence sufficient, and will feel a pleasure in
considering that an exceptional portent happened to
one so holy in his character, so exceptional in his
influence.
I appreciate and respect such a feeling, but I do not
share it. To my own mind, a strange portent needing,
to be worth anything, a juridical proof, would rather
confuse my mind, and cause me less to advert to the
simple human grandeur of the moral and spiritual
character of Jesus, as surrounded with myths it floats
down to us amidst the traditions, the love, and the
reverence of millions. If Jesus had not been what he
was, his resurrection would not have made him any
thing. There are many who believe that, as recorded
in 2 Kings xiii., a man was raised from the grave—
but no one reveres or loves him on that account.
We feel an interest in Lazarus because he and his
sisters were loved by Jesus, but those who only believe
in the moral resurrection of Lazarus, and think that
rumour materialised that into a miracle, would gain no
higher thought if they were induced to believe the
portent.
The Evangelist tells us that a great many persons
�8
The Resurrection.
were raised from the dead at the time of the death of
Jesus, and appeared to many in the streets of Jeru
salem. Those persons have never obtained from any
one either love or reverence, but only wonder what
became of them, and why they said nothing about the
death land they had left. The prodigies attributed to
the death of Moses and of Elias, only excite wonder in
the minds of those who believe them; and other
people recognise the resemblance existing between the
legendary mythology and hero worship of all nations
and of all religions. Cultured and reverent minds do
not despise or ridicule the portents which may seem
merely legendary, so long as they are interwoven with
great ideas, and represent in a material form some
lofty thought, some sublime virtue, some external
verity; they only direct attention to the fallacy of a
legend when it is being perverted to mischief.
Has the resurrection of the body of Jesus any
connection whatever with the doctrine of the im
mortality of the soul ? None. Lazarus might have
been miraculously restored to life, and then died and
come to naught, and the same as to Jesus.
Moreover, when Jesus thought he was dying and
said, “ This day thou shalt be with me in paradise,” he
testified his belief in the existence of the soul separate
from the earthly body. His coming from that future
abode to take up his body again would prove nothing,
especially as no word is attributed to him regarding
that state which he is supposed to have left.
If it were necessary for the action of the soul of
Jesus that he should resume his body, and if the
same necessity lies upon us ; Where are souls now 1
unconscious in the graves, or in non-consciousness
where ? and if Jesus thought that, how could he say
“ This day, &c.” If Paul thought that, how could he
say that he longed to depart that he might be with
Jesus.
If the author of the Revelations thought that, how
�The Resurrection.
9
could lie describe the white robed band of saints in
the spirit world.
Undoubtedly Paul attached great importance to the
dogma of the bodily resurrection ; and the unfortunate
adoption of the 15th chapter of 1st Corinthians into
the Church of England burial service has accustomed
thoughtless people, f.e., most people, to connect some
how the resurrection of the body with the immortality
of the soul. So sadly has that error possessed minds,
that we often meet with persons who have privately
come to doubt the immortality of the soul, because
they have doubted the resurrection of the body. Such
persons will quote, almost hopelessly, the words of
Paul, 11 If Christ be not risen, then is our preaching
vain, and your faith is also vain.” Your faith in
what ? In the immortality of the soul 1 No !—in the
speedy approach of the glorified reign of the Messiah
over the elect; i.e., faith in an event then universally
looked for by Christians, but which time has proved
erroneous. Before that generation had passed away
the world was to have been devastated with fire, the
Messiah to have come on the clouds of heaven to
gather and protect his chosen people ; i.e., those living
awaiting him and practising righteousness, and those
who had, to the surprise of the other Christians, died.
The death of any of the disciples amazed and dis
couraged all ; it seemed as if the Christian hope
of speedy redemption was failing. The fears of the
living were calmed by telling them that those who had
recently died should be restored to life, (just as Jesus
had been), and be numbered with the rest of the elect,
sharing with them the reign and triumph of the
Messiah. That hope enabled them to bear with pati
ence the miseries and insults to which they were
exposed.
The sublime spiritual teaching of Jesus had already
got lowered, Judaised, carnalised, materialised. His
simple-hearted disciples could not rise up to the
�IO
The Resurrection.
grandeur of his ideal. Their more sophistical suc
cessors adopted all their half-errors, and perpetuated
such by forming them into a theology, and gradually
petrifying it into creeds and formularies. It was
impossible for the Messiah and his saints to reign on
the earth, and to restore an Israel enlarged and
spiritualised, unless they possessed their bodies. ihe
saints who had died without witnessing the accom
plishment of the expectation which was to be realised
ere that generation had passed away must be placed on
an equality with the saints still in the flesh, and,
recovering their bodies, be caught up in the air to
meet the Lord at his second advent.
.
All that Pauline doctrine had nothing to do with
Christianity ; it was simply the Rabbinical fancy intro
duced and cultured for 150 years B.o. During that
period had arisen these ideas as to a Messiah, as also
the dogma of a bodily resurrection. Amidst those
dogmas Jesus had been reared—probably amongst the
ascetics of the Essenes ; possibly he accepted them ;
more probably he spiritualised them. The more we
advance in a critical study of the Gospels, the more are
we enabled to feel out our way, and to apprehend
what Jesus really said and really meant ; and the
further we advance in that reverent and cautious
criticism, the more do we discover the grandeur ot
his ideal.
,
The solemnity of to-day has borrowed and has ma
terialized that which was the. very essence of his
teaching—of a teaching so sublime, and yet so simp e,
we cannot surpass it, and yet it seems that every one
ought to have thought it. Turn from Jewish legends
about triumphant Messiahs—turn from Pauline and
Roman and Anglican legends about resurrections ot the
flesh, and let us contemplate e’er we part that resurrec
tion of the spirit which formed the essence ot the
teaching of Jesus. I speak not of the immortality ot
the soul—Jesus believed it but he did not expound 1,
�The Resurrection.
11
he added nothing to our knowledge or ideas concerning
it ; if he spoke of Hell, it was only in words like those
already used by Plato and by Rabbis ; if he spoke of
Heaven, it was only in the language of Ecclesiasticus
and Zoroaster, chastened by his love of humanity, but
he had his speciality, he had his revelation—to Jesus
the egotistic, self-seeking life was death—the earnest
loving thought and action was, life, the passing from
one to the other, resurrection. That was the essence of
his teaching, “ I am the Resurrection and the Life.”
Receive my great idea, and pass upwards from the
egotism of self, from the valley of the shadow of death,
into the light and the beauty of life, into the sweet
service of humanity. Arise from the grave of the past,
and walk in the light of great ideas, let the dead past
bury its dead, arise and live a life pure, noble, refined,
and gentle. It is only such as those, who live for ever,
borne upwards by the spirit of God. Thus the great
Master, only lowered when they surround him with
fables, stands in tears of charity by the grave of the
heart corrupt stinking amidst the rottenness of the
passions, and to the soul dead in egotism he says “Come
forth,” receive the inspiration of a noble desire : in the
name of God and of humanity arise and live. May that
thought, may that word, be to you and to me, my
brethren, a resurrection and a life—he who believeth
that word can never die.
�
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
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Victorian Blogging
Description
An account of the resource
A collection of digitised nineteenth-century pamphlets from Conway Hall Library & Archives. This includes the Conway Tracts, Moncure Conway's personal pamphlet library; the Morris Tracts, donated to the library by Miss Morris in 1904; the National Secular Society's pamphlet library and others. The Conway Tracts were bound with additional ephemera, such as lecture programmes and handwritten notes.<br /><br />Please note that these digitised pamphlets have been edited to maximise the accuracy of the OCR, ensuring they are text searchable. If you would like to view un-edited, full-colour versions of any of our pamphlets, please email librarian@conwayhall.org.uk.<br /><br /><span><img src="http://www.heritagefund.org.uk/sites/default/files/media/attachments/TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" width="238" height="91" alt="TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" /></span>
Creator
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Conway Hall Library & Archives
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2018
Publisher
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Conway Hall Ethical Society
Text
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Original Format
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Pamphlet
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
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The resurrection: an Easter morning sermon at the Free Christian Church, Croydon, London
Creator
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Suffield, Robert Rodolph
Description
An account of the resource
Place of publication: London
Collation: 43 p. ; 18 cm.
Notes: From the library of Dr Moncure Conway. Date of publication from KVK.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Thomas Scott
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
[1873]
Identifier
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G5490
Subject
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Sermons
Jesus Christ
Rights
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<a href="http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/"><img src="http://i.creativecommons.org/p/mark/1.0/88x31.png" alt="Public Domain Mark" /></a><span> </span><br /><span>This work (The resurrection: an Easter morning sermon at the Free Christian Church, Croydon, London), identified by </span><a href="https://conwayhallcollections.omeka.net/items/show/www.conwayhall.org.uk"><span>Humanist Library and Archives</span></a><span>, is free of known copyright restrictions.</span>
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Text
Language
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English
Conway Tracts
Jesus Christ- Resurrection
-
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b8599de83046cf68523402637b381002
PDF Text
Text
IS JESUS GOD?
A SERMON
PREACHED AT THE FREE CHRISTIAN CHURCH
CROYDON.
�G
/
IS JESUS GOD?
A SE RMON
PREACHED ON TRINITY SUNDAY,
AT the
FREE
CHRISTIAN
CHURCH,
CROYDON, NEAR LONDON.
BY
ROBERT RODOLPH SUFFIELD,
Minister of the Congregation.
PUBLISHED BY THOMAS
SCOTT,
NO. II THE TERRACE, FARQUHAR ROAD, UPPER NORWOOD,
LONDON, S.E.
1873.
Price Threepence.
�PRINTED BY C. W. REYNELL, LITTLE PULTENEY STREET,
HAYMARKET, . W.
�IS JESUS GOD?
--------<-------
“ The hour cometh, and now is, when the true worshippers
shall worship the Father in spirit and in truth : for the Father
seeketh such to worship Him.”— John iv. 23.
N increasing number of thoughtful men deem the
doctrine of the Deity of Jesus to be against God,
against reason, against progress, against results, against
history, against Jesus Christ, against the scriptures. Let
us briefly examine this doctrine.
In the Gospel of Luke, ch. ii., Mary, when chiding
Jesus, speaks of Joseph and herself as his parents:
“ Thy father and I have sought thee sorrowing.” The
question we consider this morning is whether, in spite
of her statement, he was in reality God, and not the son
of Joseph and Mary. This is not a question of theo
logical subtleties, as when people discuss the incompre
hensible nature and essence of the Supreme Being; it is
a question of fact; it is also a question of great practical
importance. If Jesus is God, we lose his example as
man; but, what is more important, we distance God,
worshipping Him, as Jesus, in a rebaote Heaven. More
over, we obtain a very peculiar and somewhat hopeless
idea of God, namely, as acting a part, as feeble, or
appearing as if feeble, as capable of being flogged by
His creatures, as needing food, as being educated like a
young boy; the Omnipotent in a cradle, the Eternal
A
�6
Is Jesus God?
dying, the author of life in a grave. God, so utterly
defeated, perhaps may be defeated again. God, once a
baby, once a corpse, may hereafter thus relapse.
If the universe was once guided from a cradle, presided
over from a grave, guided by one obedient to a Jewish
married couple, we ought to know it. If such state
ments are false, we ought to be disabused of them as
injurious and superstitious.
Is Jesus God ? I do not consider this morning
whether he was a specially appointed and miraculous
Messiah, whether he was supernaturally born, or whether
his soul had in some way pre-existed, but, was he
God ? is he God ? not in some fanciful, poetical, unreal
way, but according to the belief of the Churches of
Rome, of England, of Scotland, as expressed in formu
laries, articles, and creeds: “ God of God, Light of
Light, Very God of Very God, of one substance with the
Father• ” as expressed in the collect for Christmas Day,
“ Our Lord Jesus Christ who liveth and reigneth with
Thee, ever one God, world without end,” and in the last
prayer of the Morning and Evening service (prayer of
St Chrysostom), where Jesus is addressed as “Almighty
God ”—or, as in the Litany, where he is addressed as
“God the Son,” and then, throughout the whole Litany,
invoked, to the neglect of God the Father—for, ex
cepting a few sentences, all the Litany is addressed to
Jesus. It is not the God of the Universe we find ad
dressed—but a God who had an incarnation, a nativity,
a circumcision, a baptism, a temptation, and a death—
such as, “ the Good Lord ” is asked to deliver us from
all the interior sins of the soul; from murder, heresy,*
and sudden death; and as supreme over the earth and
skies, is asked to preserve to our use the kindly fruits
and the due seasons. Watts, in one of his hymns,
speaks of “ This infant is the Mighty God, Come to be
* How shocking to associate with crimes the honourable
variations of opinion upon difficult questions.
�Is Jesus God?
7
suckled and adored;” and in another hymn he speaks of
Jesus as the “Infant Deity,” the “Bleeding God.”
The great Church of England divine, South, in
his defence of the Deity of Jesus, condemns “ the
men who cannot (as he says) persuade themselves
that Deity and Infinity could lie in the contemptible
dimensions of a human body;” “that- omnipotence,
omniscience, and omnipresence should be wrapped in
swaddling clothes; that the glorious Artificer of the
Universe who spread out the Heavens like a curtain, and
laid the foundations of the earth, turned carpenter, and
exercised his trade in a small shop,” &c. &c. The cele
brated defence of the Church of England, entitled the
4 Characters of a Believing Christian,’ and commended
by Convocation, thus presents a summary of Christian
belief: “ He believes a virgin to be the mother of a son,
and that very son of hers to be her Maker. He believes
Him whom Heaven and Earth could not contain to
have been shut up in a narrow womb ; to have been born
in time; who was and is from everlasting; to have been
a weak child carried in arms, who is the Almighty, and
Him once to have died who only hath in Himself life
and immortality.” Such is the faith which, according
to all the so-called orthodox Churches, is necessary to
everlasting salvation.
Such is the orthodox dogma of the Deity of Jesus.
Is not the very statement of it enough to prove the first
two heads of my argument—that it is against God, his
greatness and unchangeableness, against reason, and all
the apprehensions of our mind ?
But some, who in recent days have embraced a new
dogmatic position, and who teach that Jesus was not
God in the orthodox sense, but only as a kind of mani
festation of God, argue against us, and say, “ By denying
such a divinity in the nature of Jesus you lower
humanity—it is good to admit that in one human body
and one human soul the divine soul of the Universe was
breathing, inspiring, dwelling.” We reply: “ Un
�8
Is Jesus God?
doubtedly; but such dogma, thus explained, is a
heresy according to the decision of all the Churches ;
you have borrowed the idea from us, and limited to
Jesus what we declare to be in various degrees the
appanage of all; we recognise the Divine Soul of the
Universe, breathing through all souls, and according to
the great word of Jesus, making all men “ one with him,
and one with his father.” The dogma of the Deity of
Jesus deprives us of the greatest idea of God, violates
the reason and consciousness of mankind, and, if
explained mystically, limits to one what belongs to all.”
It may be said, “What matter,—it pleases some,—others
could not part with the idea without pain.” We reply:
“ It impedes progress, it involves the perpetuation of all
abuses ; to protect this dogma of the deity of Jesus we
must have creeds, articles, complicated theologies,
anathemas, persecutions, and priesthoods; we must dis
courage astronomy because it reminds of God’s immen
sity, and reject geology because it proclaims this world’s
antiquity. The doctrine cannot be proved out of the
Scripture, therefore, sooner or later, its advocates must
fall back upon the Church. The orthodox divines argue
that the doctrine of the deity of Jesus is very consoling
and beneficial because it brings God nearer to us. The
Roman Catholic replies: “Not at all so, unless you
admit that he still dwells amongst us in the Host on the
altar.” The orthodox Protestants say: “ We cannot
believe that God is contained in a little gilt box, or
carried about in a clergyman’s waistcoat pocket.” The
Roman Catholic replies, “ How inconsistent, since you
already believe that He was once contained in a
manger in a stable and seated on Mary’s lap,
The orthodox say, “ There are some isolated passages
of Scripture which imply the Deity of Jesus.” The
Roman Catholic replies, “ There are as many passages
which insinuate the supremacy of the Pope, the Deity
of the Host, and the everlasting damnation of
unbelievers.” The Roman Catholic says, “We hold
�Is Jesus God?
9
■with you the Athanasian dogma; our Church is
the chief upholder of the Deity of Jesus; in the
Church of England you have bishops, priests, and very
many people who deny it; the Dissenters are not always
clearly and persistently orthodox on the subject, all the
advocates of free thought reject it, the German successors
of Luther either deny it or explain it away; in this
Church of the Pope it is guarded with a vigilance and
anxiety nowhere else to be found.” But the Roman
Church is also the avowed enemy of all progress, of all
liberty, of all science, of all mental and moral independ
ence. Thus the dogma of the Deity of Jesus stands
as a barrier against all the progress, the liberties and
the education of mankind.
4thly,—Results prove the falsity of the dogma. The
God of the Universe, 1,800 years ago, was born into a
Jewish family, lived amongst people who did not find
out that he was God, his mother ordered him about and
reproved him, his friends and disciples argued with
him, contradicted him, invited him, and went out to
dinner with him—but they knew not that he was
their Creator. In distress we fly to God ; the disciples
were in distress, but they fled away from Jesus.
And the results at the present time, what are they ?
The Jews are supposed to have possessed prophecies
to enable them to discern Jesus as their God. The
8,000,000 Jews still reject him as even a Messiah, and
as to the supposed prophecy of him in Isaiah as God,
they say that the English translation is so maliciously
distorted that an educated Hebrew boy scorns such
dishonest perversions of the sacred books of his nation.
In the East, when after six centuries the dogma of the
deity of Jesus got established, a new religion arose to
denounce it as an idolatry, and 120,000,000 of Mahommedans as a protest against such an idolatry, invoke
the one universal, all-pervading God, when, day by day,
His name is proclaimed from the minaret of a hundred
thousand mosques. One million Parsees still, as in the
�IO
Is Jesus God?
days of old, proclaim the One God. This God-Jesus,
created by Greek and Boman Bishops, has never won
belief amidst the 120,000,000 of the Brahminical
religion, or amongst the 189,000,000, of Pagans, or
amongst the 483,000,000 of Buddhists, His deity is
only partially admitted amidst the 171,000,000 of
Protestants, though strenuously maintained by the
182,000,000 of those who declare that, through the
Pope, this modern God alone commands. What a
success for a Deity !
But, 5thly,—What says History ? The orthodox
teachers tell us now, that the deity of Jesus is the one
great feature of Christianity, that on it rests the essen
tial dogmas of the atonement and of a vicarious re
demption from an eternal hell.
We turn to the first sermons of the first propagators
of Christianity. St Paul propounds Christianity at
Lystra, amidst a multitude prepared to offer sacrifice to
him, and he does not even name Jesus; but he warned
them to turn from such like vanities (man-worship),
“ to turn to the living God, who made heaven and earth
and the sea, and all things that are therein.” Such was
the teaching necessary for the salvation of Asia Minor—■
nothing about the deity of Jesus. Paul went to Athens,
and on the Hill of Mars, from the very throne of the
Greek philosophy, surrounded by the temples of the
deified men who had become gods of war, of beauty, of
love, of art, and of wisdom, he proclaimed the Chris
tianity deemed sufficient for the salvation of Greece—
but not one word about the deity of Jesus—but, inviting
them to turn from such superstitions, he says : “ Whom
ye ignorantly worship, him declare I unto you—God
that made the world and all things therein, seeing that
He is Lord of heaven and earth, dwelleth not in temples
made with hands, neither is worshipped with men’s
hands ; as though He needed anything, seeing He giveth
to all life, and breath, and all things ; and hath made
of one blood (life) all nations of men for to dwell on
�Is Jesus God?
II
all the face of the earth, and hath determined the times
before appointed and the bounds of their habitation ;
that they should seek the Lord if haply they might feel
after Him, and find Him, though He be not far from
every one of us: for in Him we live and move and have
our being; as certain also of your own poets have said,
For we are also His offspring. Forasmuch, then, as we
are the offspring of God, we ought not to think that
the Godhead is like unto gold, or silver, or stone, graven
by art and man’s device. He now commandeth all
men everywhere to repent (reform), because He hath
appointed a day in which He will judge the world in
righteousness by that man whom He hath ordained.”
What was the first sermon ever preached by a
disciple of Jesus ? On the day we now call Whit
Sunday, Peter lifted up his voice, and for the first
time proclaimed Christianity (Acts ii.) He therein
announced that all Christians would have the power of
working miracles, and proclaimed other portents and
prodigies, but uttered not one word as to the deity of
Jesus ; but he solemnly exclaims : “ Ye men of Israel,
hear these words, Jesus of Nazareth, a man approved
of God, by wicked hands crucified and slain,” &c., and
he ends by proclaiming Jesus to be the Master and the
Messiah, that is “Lord and Christ.” Thus Christianity
could be first solemnly announced to the world without
one word about the deity of Jesus or his atonement.
Any one now preaching that sermon of Peter would be
declared by all to be a Unitarian of the school of Chan
ning, and Priestley, and Belsham. Look at the address
of the first martyr, Stephen (Acts vii.), not one word
.about the deity of Jesus. In Acts ix. read the account
of the supposed miraculous conversion of St Paul.
Jesus is described as appearing to him, but he does not
announce himself as God. The converted Saul preached
to prove that Jesus is the Messiah, or to use the current
Jewish expression, the Son of God, or the Christ—e.g.,
ix. 22—“ Saul increased the more in strength, and
�12
Is Jesus God?
confounded the Jews which dwelt at Damascus, proving
that this is the Christ.” Why he ought to have proved
that Jesus is the Creator and Supreme God. On the
pages of history we can trace the gradual growth of this
dogma. Platonists, like Philo, had introduced the idea
of a Logos (i.e., Power, or Beason, or Word) dwelling in
the Supreme Being and emanating from Him. That
Platonic notion engrafted itself into Christianity, and
gradually produced the Nicene and Athanasian creeds.
How gradual was the corruption of Christianity we can
perceive by examining the works of Origen, that man of
profound and varied learning, who, after writing many
commentaries on the sacred Scriptures, died a.d. 254.
The Pagan superstition of praying to Jesus had already
spread amongst the ignorant multitude, for Origen, in
his treatise on prayer, says: “ Prayer is never to be
offered to any originated being, not to Christ himself,
but only to the God and Father of all.” For when his
disciples asked him, “ Teach us to pray,” he did not
teach them to pray to himself, but to the Father—con
formably to what he said: “ Why callest thou me good ?
there is none good but one, God the Father.” How
could he say otherwise than, “ Why dost thou pray to
me ? Prayer, as you learn from the Scriptures,is to be
offered to the Father only, to whom I myself pray.”
It is not consistent with reason for those to pray to a
brother who are esteemed worthy of one Father with
him. “You with me, and through me, are to address
your prayer to the Father alone.” Let us, then, at
tending to what was said by Jesus, pray to God with
out any division as to the mode of prayer. But are we
not divided if some pray to the Father and some to the
Son. Those who pray to the Son fall into a gross error
through want of judgment and examination.” Such
was the teaching of a man unrivalled among Christians
for his virtues and his wisdom, whose death was the
result of the tortures he endured for his faith. As
Christians deteriorated morally they became addicted to
�Is 'Jesus God?
T3
sophistry, superstition, and Pagan imitations ; the dogma
of the deity of Jesus gained ground till it was, at length,
formally established by Bishops who deemed their
deliberations inspired; once established with the help
of numerous cruel persecutions, and in defiance of
innumerable protests, it was received by the Gothic con
verts, and afterwards by the first Protestants on autho
rity ; but, whenever Protestants carry out their princi
ples, and inquire, we find the most illustrious rejecting
the deity of Jesus, witness, amongst so many others,
Milton,* John Locke, Sir Isaac Newton, and, at the
present time, almost all the leaders in science, in philo
sophy, in criticism, and in literature.
6thly,—The dogma is opposed to Jesus Christ; it is
a libel upon his moral character. If he was God, he
ought not to have said “ The Father is greater than I; ”
“ I go to my God and your God.” He ought not to
have prayed and to have said in his agony, “ Remove
from me this cup, nevertheless not what I will but what
Thou wilt; ” and, with his last breath, “ Father into
thy hands I commit my spirit ; ” “ My doctrine is not
mine but His that sent me; ” “ As my Father hath
taught me I speak these things ; ” “I seek not my own
glory, but I honour my Father; ” “To sit on my right
hand and on my left is not mine to give ; ” I come not
to do my own will but the will of Him that sent me—I
do nothing of myself.” He was tempted, he prayed to
God, he gave thanks to God: “ Father, I thank Thee
that Thou hast heard me.” He declared his ignorance
of important matters—“ Of that day knoweth no man,
not the angels, neither the son, but my Father only; ”
“ My God, my God, why hast Thou forsaken me ? ”
“In that day ye shall ask me nothing.” The life, the
conduct, the language of Jesus combine in showing him
to be man. The advocates of his deity adduce expres
sions which on other occasions he applies equally to all
his brethren.
* Milton’s last work is a scriptural argument to disprove
the Trinity, and the Deity of Jesus.
�14
Is Jesus God f
The Jesuits argue that it is lawful to* conceal the
greatest truths and the gravest matters, and to act as if
they were not—for, they say,—“Jesus was God, he
concealed his Deity, and by that concealment deceived
everybody—and we ought to imitate him.” Their argu
ment is logical; the immorality can only be censured by
those who deny the deity of Jesus. If it is replied he
was both God and man, whatever does not suit for one
nature must be applied to the other, we say “ Where is
that evasive doctrine of contradiction ever stated,”
when by Jesus ? by what apostle ? Nowhere; it was
the sophistical invention of subtle Greek bishops when
they had determined on the deification of Jesus, and
had to reconcile their superstition with the life and
words of Jesus.
7thly,—The dogma, if admitted, is destructive of the
character of all the New Testament writers. Even
were we to admit as genuine the passages now univer
sally admitted to be spurious, such as the three witnesses
in St John, even accepting the mistranslations of King
James’s version as if correct, accepting as of apostolic
age what is falsely entitled the Gospel of St John,—all
that can then be said in defence of the deity of Jesus is
that a few passages here and there exalt Jesus very
much, and are considered by many to point to his
divinity. But as such passages are deemed by others
no proof at all, and as the entire tenor and drift of each
writer is quite opposed to the deity, it would have been
most dishonest of a writer to have introduced so trans
cendently important a dogma only in a casual incidental
way, and never accompanied with statements calculated,
if not to convince of the truth of the dogma, at least to
show that it was held. The adorers of the God-Jesus
now do not thus convey their teaching, they do not
incidentally insinuate the dogma amidst entire pages of
an opposite tenor; but they insist on it as the one
essential feature of Christianity; they propound it in
the minutest mode ; they anathematise all who cannot
�Is Jesus God ?
*5
believe it; they address prayers and litanies to Jesus as
God ; they supplement the scriptures with explanations
and history with false statements; and by complicated
controversies they deem it possible to prove what is
declared to be essential to the salvation of all.
My brethren, the deifier and adorer of Jesus, the
deifier and adorer of Buddha, is doubtless, if sincere
and good, as pleasing to the Supreme Being as the
adorer of God. Salvation consists in truthfulness of
speech and act, in goodness, in earnestness, in selfdevotion to the highest thoughts we know.
The adorers of a deified Jew are doubtless as pleasing
to God as those who adore their Creator, so long as
their adoration is the truthful expression of their
thought; when it ceases to be such, their adoration is
an immorality.
But strive to hasten on the time when the poor souls
of our brethren shall no longer be lacerated with the
conscientious endeavour to accept as essential what they
cannot prove.
True religion needs no critical and learned arguments,
no gods who have to be proved by texts and supported
by arduous apologies; the living truth is in the con
science and the soul of man. Be true to yourself and
you will be true to God. Let worthy ecclesiastics prove
out their gods ; we will be content if we can love some
what better the God and Father of all, and in Him love
and serve all our brethren. This short life will soon be
over: ’ere it has passed away may we have helped for
ward some we love to thoughts more holy, more truthful,
more happy, more grand, more beautiful than super
stition.—Amen. So be it.
��NOTES.
.
(1) The aggregations which cluster around the memory of a
great character vary with the traditions and characteristics of
the people who are the grateful recipients of his benefits. If
Jesus had been born in Athens, Rome, Mexico, or India, the
mythological legends created by credulous affection to enshrine
his life, and embellish his teaching, would have taken their
character from some superstition or philosophy pervading in
the locality. Early biographies published in other countries
would, in all probability, combine their national conceptions
with those of the country of his birth. Thus in the three
earliest Gospels we find Jewish actions and teaching attributed
to Jesus, and genealogies tracing his descent from David and
Abraham. He is a Jew of Jewish origin, a miraculous Messiah,
a Theist teaching the pure monotheism which was the highest
development of Jewish religious thought. Those three Gos
pels, although varying in many important details, are similar
in general tone and scope. The Fourth Gospel not only intro
duces special variations and contradictions, but is essentially
different in its conception of the teaching and spirit of Jesus.
That Gospel, first named by Irenaeus, who died a.d. 203, was
probably compiled by a Christian of Ephesus, perhaps John
the Presbyter, with the help of traditions, and perhaps MSS.,
bearing the name of John the Evangelist. Ephesus was one
of the towns in which dominated the mystical Platonic Philo
sophy, as modified by Philo the Jew, about the time of the
birth of Jesus; therefore the writer surrounds Jesus with two
aggregations, the Judaic and the Platonic. Our Poets
personify “Fear,” “Hope,” “Charity,” “Envy,” “Melan
choly.” The Platonists not only personified, but considered
that all existing things had an original idea substantially
B
�18
Notes.
abiding in the mind of God, in whom was moreover a faculty
•or power whereby He arranged the ideas after which He
moulded all things. The “ Logos ” (i.e., “ Power,” “ Wisdom,”
-or “Word”) was this faculty existing in the Divine Soul, and
in different degrees manifesting itself in great and good men.
Thus Philo calls Moses “ the Divine Logos,” the “ law-giving
Logos,” the “ supplicating Logos (alluding to his intercession
for the Jews).” Aaron he calls the “Sacred Logos.” He
repeatedly calls the Jewish High Priest the “Logos.” He calls
good men the “ Logos.” The attribute in God which fills,
inspires, and manifests itself in men, he thus describes “The
Logos is the eldest creation of God, the Eternal Father,
eldest son, God’s image, mediator between God and the world,
the highest angel, the second God, the High Priest, the Recon
ciler, Intercessor for the world and men, whose manifestation is
especially visible in the history of the Jewish people.” And Philo
thus addresses his Jewish readers : “ If you are not yet worthy
to be denominated a Son of God, be earnest to put on the
graces of His First Begotten Logos, the most ancient . . .
for if we are not prepared to be esteemed children of
God, we may, at all events, be thus related to the most
Holy Logos . . . for the most ancient Logos is the image
of God.” Philo personifies “ Wisdom and Goodness,” but
he does not seem to regard them as real Persons, but only as
“ Ideas ” in the divine mind, which breathe forth into the soul
of men. Thus a Platonic Jew writing a memoir of Jesus
amongst the disciples of Philo in Ephesus, amongst people
familiar with the language regarding wisdom in “ Ecclesiasticus,” “ Wisdom,” &c. Writing, moreover, with a controversial
object, as he affirms (ch. xx. 31), instead of giving any genea
logy or nativity of Jesus, commences his narrative with the
verses we may perhaps best render thus: “ In the beginning was
the wisdom, and the wisdom was with God, and God was the
wisdom. This wasin the beginningwithGod. All things through
it rose into being, and without it arose not even one thing which
has arisen. In it is life, and the life was the light of men, and the
light shines on in the darkness, and the darkness did not
�Notes.
J9
apprehend it............................................ The true light which
enlightens every man, continued coming into the world. . .
. . It came to its own peculiar [home] and its own peculiar
[people] received it not................................... And the wisdom
became flesh [was manifested in a man], and tabernacled
amongst us.............................No one has ever seen God: the
only begotten son [i.e., Wisdom, the Logos], who is upon the
bosom of the Father, declared Him.”
How the language reminds us of Philo’s apostrophe to wis
dom or Logos, as “ the assessor of God prior to all creatures,
a needful companion of deity, joint originator with Him of all
things.” Origen, who died a.d. 253, and Eusebius, who died
A d. 340, notice that as there is no article in the Greek before
the word God, the signification is “ and the wisdom was a
God,” an epithet frequently applied in the Sacred' writings to
designate judges, authorised teachers, commissioned rulers,
angels, and those Beings adored by Gentile nations. (Ex.gr.~)
“ God judgeth amongst the gods,” “ I have said, ye are gods,”
“Thou shalt not revile the gods.” Again, Origen, although
maintaining the pre-existence of all souls, and that emanations
from the deity, like the rays of light from the sun penetrate
into the dark chambers of the human heart, to enlighten and
to abide, and believing that Jesus must have received such
divine in-dwelling light of wisdom, yet disclaims utterly the
superstition which was then rapidly advancing, and which pro
fessed to limit such to Jesus as exceptional and exclusive of
others. “ The great body of those who are considered as
believers, knowing nothing but Jesus Christ, thinking that the
Logos appearing in a man is the whole of the Logos, are
acquainted with Christ only according to the flesh.”
The Platonic idea of the Logos moulding the souls of good
men and dwelling in them, was often interwoven with the
Pythagorean doctrine of the pre-existence of souls, and in
that combination is attributed to Jesus in the Fourth Gospel
(though never in the earlier Gospels) ex. gr. John viii. 58.
.
(2) There are many passages adduced from the OldTestament
to confirm the popular idea of the deification of Jesus ; someB2
�1O
Notes.
times by adaptation, sometimes by referring to Jesus, passages
wherein the Jewish nation is personified and individualised.
Thus, in Isaiah, all the words applied by Trinitarian commen
tators to a suffering Messiah, regard the sufferings of “ God’s
servant Israel,” the Jewish nation’s sufferings “ expiating ” the
national sins, “ moving God to compassion,” and preluding an
immediate and triumphant restoration. In such sense those
passages were understood by the Jews at the tjme and since,
and it is only by artifices of mistranslation that the meaning is
perverted, ex. gr., “ a virgin shall conceive and bear a son,’*
should be “the young woman ” (probably Isaiah’s wife) “ will
conceive and bear a son.” The birth of his other sons, and
the names imparted to them, had signified events just to occur,
the birth of this one, named Emanuel, was to signify the
speedy deliverence of the Jews from the invading kings.
.
(3) A few detached and casual texts are relied on by Trini
tarians as the basis of their belief in the deity of Jesus, ex. gr.
Thomas the Apostle, who did not believe in the bodily resur
rection, is described as seeing Jesus alive, and, just as we ex
claim in surprise “ Good God,” so Thomas exclaimed “ My
Master! my God.” The Apostle who had, up to that moment,
supposed the statement of the resurrection to be a mere “ idle
woman’s tale,” cannot, by feeling the mangled side of Jesus,
have all at once arrived at a belief heretofore unexpected and
unasked, namely, that Jesus was not only the Messiah but the
God of the Universe. People acquainted with ecclesiastical
history do not attach much importance to the “ traditions ” of
the first six centuries, whereby the deity of Jesus was esta
blished—but Keble, in his Oxford Sermons, says most truly:
“ I need hardly remind you of the unquestioned historical fact
that the very Nicene Creed itself, to which, perhaps, of all
formulae we are most indebted for our sound belief in the proper
divinity of the Son of God—even this creed had its origin,
not from the Scriptures, but from tradition.”
We now derive our conceptions of God from the human soul.
God is to the universe what our soul is to our body; therefore the
higher our idea of man the higher our idea of God. But nations in
�Notes.
21
their infancy worshipped God piecemeal, or portions of nature
or a human form. Hence Paganism, Brahmahism, and Budd
hism had their incarnations, Judaism had no incarnation, but
Jehovah was regarded as a man who could talk, eat, walk
about, be angry and pleased, and take sides like a man.
When the Greek and Latin Bishops had, after some cen
turies, got the dogma into a definite form, the Scriptures
provided a few questionable passages which were useful for
the defence of a foregone conclusion. If we include amongst
such the passages interpolated, corrupted, and mistranslated,
the only subject for wonder is that so tremendous a dogma
should have so little to appeal to. Amongst the corrupted
texts, we would allude to 1 Tim. iii. 16, wherein the word
“ God ” is spurious. In Acts xx. 28, where the true reading is
“ Church of the Master ” and not Church of “ God.”
Amongst mistranslations, we might advert to Phil. ii. 5,
“ thought it not robbery to be equal with God.” This is
deemed by Trinitarians one of their very few decisive passages,
though even as it stands it is not worth much, for it would
be absurd to speak of “ God thinking it not robbery to be
equal with God.” The expression that Christ was “ in the
form of God,” or “ as God,” or the “ image of God,” does not
seem to imply anything more than when it is said to a child,
“ You must look on your parents as representing God to you.”
On the dogma of the deity of Jesus rests the Papacy, the
sacramental system, ecclesiastical exclusiveness, the denun
ciations of I Heresy,” the atonement, and all the numerous
doctrines which form one or other of the forms of orthodoxy ;
and yet that stupendous dogma rests upon only a few inci
dental texts.
(4) Prayer to Jesus is nowhere enjoined in the New Testa
ment ; and yet it could not, according to the orthodox theory,
be a matter of indifference. It was either to be done, or it
was not to be done. The introduction of a new object for
prayer was a vast change; it demanded special directions, so
that the two objects of prayer might retain what were proper
for each: no such explanations exist; no precept for its
�22
Notes,
observance. There are allusions to those blessings of which
Jesus Christ was deemed the minister to men—ex gr. “ Grace
through Jesus Christ,” “ the Grace of Jesus Christ.” There
are allusions to the interest which Jesus was supposed to
exhibit towards his disciples on earth, but nothing implying
prayer to him as God. There is no evidence that the' las t
words of Stephen, in which he prayed for his murderers, were
addressed to Christ.
But one portion of his speech was spoken to Jesus, who
(according to the narrative) was standing before him, and as
his friend and master could be asked therefore to receive his
dying breath.
(5) Suppose Jesus to have been miraculously born, to have
healed the sick, raised the dead, ascended into heaven, and
helped his followers from his heavenly abode—such miracles
would not prove him to be any greater than those men to
whom similar powers are attributed iu the Old Testament.
(6) All Religions surround their Infant Gods with similar
legends. Thus, in the sacred books of the Buddhists, we read
that, when Buddha, the God-man was born, “the Holy King,
the Grand Being, turning His eyes towards the East, regarded
the vast host of the angels, Brahmas and Devas, Asuras,
Granharvas, Repamas, and Garudas, and they rained flowers
and offerings upon him, and bowed in adoration, praising him
and crying, “ Behold the excellent Lord, to whom none can be
compared, to whom there is no superior; and the ten thousand
worlds quaked, and the Universe was illumined with an
exceeding bright light.” Of Confucius it is written, “ He may
be compared to heaven and earth in their supporting and
containing all things; he may be compared to the four seasons
in their alternating progress, to the sun and moon in their
successive shining. He is the Equal of Heaven. Call him an
Ideal man, how earnest is he! Call him an abyss, how deep I
Call him Heaven, how vast 1 ” When Mohammed was born, we
are told in the sacred legends of the Moslems “ that a bright
light issued from the breast of his mother, illumined all Arabia,
and then, penetrating into Paradise, caused 70,000 palaces of
�Notes.
23
pearls and rubies to spring into being; that, when he was
three years of age, two angels opened his side, took out his
heart, pressed from it the black drops of sin, replacing them
with the light of prophecy.” When Jesus was born, we are
told, in the sacred legends of the Christians, that “ a star left
its station in the heavens to indicate his birthplace, kings of
unknown lands travelled, with miraculous speed, to lay gifts
at his feet, angels filled the air with their songs, making the
mountain sides radiant with light. That child of Nazareth is
described, in the theological legends of later followers, as
eternal, omnipresent, omniscient, omnipotent, sinless, as
Creator and Preserver of the Universe, as the head of the
Spiritual World, forgiver of sins, final Judge and Rewarder,
in all things equal with God.” Thus does superstition com
press God into a man, and elevate a man into a God.
(7) Since men have learned the vastness of the Creation,
and the antiquity of the world, the dogma of the deity of
Jesus has become more incredible. Scholars admit that it
cannot be proved out of the Scriptures in any way calculated
to satisfy those who know the ignorance existing as to the
authorship of those Scriptures, their authority, originals, and
translations. Roman Catholics admit that it is impossible to
prove anything certain out of the Scriptures, therefore they
assert that the deity of Je3us, like all other dogmas, can be
only accepted on the authority of the Church ; but the autho
rity of the Church has declared that infallibility rests in the
mind of the Pope whenever he intends to use his infallibility.
But how is the infallibility of the Pope proved ? By the
words of Jesus Christ. And yet those very words can be
accepted by Greeks, Protestants, and Theists, who cannot see
in them any assertion of the modern Roman doctrine. Thus
infallibility rests upon disputed texts in books of uncertain
date and uncertain origin; therefore it can never become, to
any individual, anything more than a probable opinion liable
to error—an opinion which, only three years ago, was deemed
by all the most cultured Roman Catholics to be absurd,
unproved, dangerous, unhistoric, uncatholic.
�24
Notes.
(8) From the intuitions of the human mind ; from its
reasonings, feelings, and aspirations ; from its sense of right
and wrong; from all these combined in the experiences of
mankind, and presented to us in the history of humanity, we
can obtain a Religion of Life and of Hope, of discipline and
trustful repose; such, held with diffidence, with earnestness,
with reverence, with fortitude, and with tenderness, revealing
itself in harmony with science, and with our highest moral
and spiritual aspirations, gathering into itself from all
Churches, Sects, and Scriptures, whatever is of universal
application, will keep evolving itself to the soul of man, and
presenting to us as much of certainty as is obtainable in the
ordinary affairs of life, why demand for the future a certainty
of a kind essentially differing from what is adequate for our
daily actions and our daily hopes.
The only theory of God’s moral government which conforms
to our sense of justice in presence of the various opposing
beliefs held by men equally good, truth loving, and anxious,
is that what is really important is attainable by all—namely,
to be truthful in word and act to whatever we think, to strive
to think as correctly as we can, and to practise according to
our light and means, the best to which we see our way. Such
is the best and the happiest religion.
The Author of this sermon will be glad to communi
cate to inquirers, books adapted to aid their researches
into matters which could only be glanced at in these
pages.
The reader is earnestly advised to study the works
of James Martineau, Francis Newman, Theodore Parker,
Hennell, Frances Power Cobbe, Dr Vance Smith, and
those catalogued on the following pages, which can be
procured from the Publisher.
�INDEX
TO
THOMAS SCOTT’S PUBLICATIONS,
alphabetically arranged.
The following Pamphlets and Papers may be had on addressing
a letter enclosing the price in postage sta/mps to Mr Thomas
Scott, 11 The Terrace, Farquhar Boad, Upper Norwood,
London, S.N.
Price.
Post-free.
s. cl.
ABBOT, FRANCIS E„ Editor of ‘Index,’ Toledo, Ohio, U.S.A.
The Impeachment
of Christianity. With Letters from Miss Frances
P. Cobbe and Professor F. W. Newman, giving their Reasons for not
calling themselves Christians
-OS
Truths for the Times
•
•
-03
ANONYMOUS.
A.I. Conversations. Recorded by a Woman, for Women. Parts I., II.,
and III. 6d. each Part
-16
A Few Self-Contradictions of the Bible
- 1 0
Modern Orthodoxy and Modern Liberalism
- 0 6
Modern Protestantism. By the Author of “ The Philosophy of
Necessity”
-06
On Public Worship
-03
Questions to which the Orthodox are Earnestly Requested to Give
Answers ------01
Sacred History as
a
Branch of Elementary Education.
Part I.—Its Influence on the Intellect. Part II.—Its Influence on the
Development of the Conscience. 6d. each Part
- 1 0
The Church and its Reform. A Reprint - 1 0
The Church : the Pillar and Ground of the Truth
- 0 6
The Opinions of Professor David F. Strauss
- 0 6
The Twelve Apostles
-06
Via Catholica; or, Passages from the Autobiography of a Country
Parson. Part I. -13
Woman’s Letter -03
BARRISTER, A.
Notes
on
Bishop Magee’s Pleadings for Christ
-
-
- 0 6
-
-
- 0 3
BASTARD, THOMAS H0RL00K.
Scepticism
and
Social Justice
-
-
�Index to Thomas Scott's Publications,
11
Price.
Post-free.
BENEFICED CLERGYMAN OF THE CHURCH OF ENGLAND.
The Chronological Weakness of Prophetic Interpretation - 1 1
The Evangelist and the Divine - 1 0
The Gospel of the Kingdom
- 0 6
BENTHAM, JEREMY.
The Church
of
England Catechism Examined. A Reprint
-10
BERNSTEIN, A.
Origin of the Legends of
Critically Examined -
Abraham, Isaac,
Jacob
-10
-
-
=
BROOK, W. 0. CARR.
Beason versus Authority BROWN, GAMALIEL.
An Appeal to the Preachers
Sunday Lyrics
The New Doxology
•
and
-
-
.
-
-03
Creeds -
-
- 0 3
-03
- 0 3
of all the
-
-
-
-
CARROLL, Rev. W. G., Rector of St Bride’s, Dublin.
The Collapse
of the
by the Orthodox -
Faith; or, the Deity of Christ as now taught
-
-
-
-
-
-06
CLARK, W. G., M.A., Vice-Master of Trinity College, Cambridge.
A Review of a Pamphlet, entitled, “ The Present Dangers of the Church
of England ”
-06
CLERGYMAN OF THE CHURCH OF ENGLAND.
An Examination of Canon Liddon’s Bampton Lectures
Letter and Spirit Rational Piety and Prayers for Fine Weather
The Analogy of Nature and Religion—Good and Evil The Question o*f Method, as affecting Religious Thought
-
- 0 6
-06
- 0 3
- 0 6
- 0 3
COBBE, Miss F. P.
Letter
on
Christian Name. (See Abbot)
CONWAY, MONCURE D.
The Spiritual Serfdom of the Laity. With Portrait
The Voysey Case -
-
- 0 6
-06
COUNTRY PARSON, A.
The Thirty-Nine Articles and
the Creeds,—Their Sense and their
Non-Sense. Parts I., II., and III. 6d. each Part
- 1 6
COUNTRY VICAR, A.
Criticism the Restoration of Christianity, being a Review of a
Paper by Dr Lang
-
The Bible for Man, not Man
-
for the
-
Bible
-
-06
- 0 6
-
-
-
-
•
-
CRANBROOK, The late Rev. JAMES.
On the Formation of Religious Opinions On the Hindrances to Progress in Theology
The Tendencies of Modern Religious Thought
0 3
0 3
0 3
F. H. I.
Spiritual Pantheism
-
-
-
-06
FOREIGN CHAPLAIN.
The Efficacy
of
Prayer. A Letter to Thomas Scott
-
- 0 3
�iii
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FORMER ELDER IN A SCOTCH CHURCH.
On Religion
....
-06
GELDART, Rev. E. M.
The Living God
-
’
-
-
-
•
-0 3
-
-
-
-
-
-03
-
-04
GRAHAM, A. D., and F. H.
On Faith
-
-
HANSON, Sir R. D., Chief-Justice of South Australia.
Science and Theology
-
-
-
-
HARE, The Right Rev. FRANCIS, D.D., formerly Lord Bishop of
Chichester.
The Difficulties
the Scriptures
and
Discouragements which Attend the Study of
-
-
-
-
-
-
-06
HINDS, SAMUEL, D.D., late Bishop of Norwich.
Annotations on the Lord’s Prayer. (See Scott’s Practical Remarks)
Another Reply to the Question, “What have we got to Rely
on, if we cannot Rely on the Bible ? ” (See Professor Newman’s
Reply) *
-06
A Reply to the Question, “ Apart from Supernatural Revela
tion, what is the Prospect of Man’s Living after Death ? ” 0 6
A Reply to the Question, “ Shall I Seek Ordination in the
Church of England?”
- 0 6
Free Discussion of Religious Topics. Part I., is. Part II., Is. 6d. 2 6
The Nature and Origin of Evil. A Letter to a Friend
- 0 6
HOPPS, Rev. J. PAGE.
Thirty-Nine Questions
Portrait -
on
-
-
the
Thirty-Nine Articles.
-
-
-
-
With
-0 3
JEVONS, WILLIAM.
The Book of Common Prayer Examined in the Light of the
Present Age. Parts I. and II. 6d. each Part
- 1 0
The Claims of Christianity to the Character of a Divine
. Revelation Considered
- 0 6
The Prayer Book adapted to the Age - 0 3
KALISCH, M., Ph.D.
of the Past and the Future. Reprinted from Part I. of
his Commentary on Leviticus. With Portrait
- 1 0
Theology
KIRKMAN, The Rev. THOMAS P., Rector of Croft, Warrington.
Church Cursing and Atheism
-
- 1 0
On Church Pedigrees. Parts I. and II. With Portrait. 6d. each Part 1 0
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LAKE, J. W.
The Mythos of the Ark
-
-
-
-
-'-06
LA TOUCHE, J. D., Vicar of Stokesay, Salop.
The Judgment
Mr Voysey
of the
-
Committee of Council in the Case of
-
-
-
-
-
-03
-
-
-06
- 0 6
-
- 1 0
LAYMAN, A, and M.A. of Trinity College, Dublin.
Law and the Creeds
Thoughts on Religion and the Bible
-
M.A., Trinity College, Cambridge.
Pleas
for
Free Inquiry. Parts I. and II. 6d. each Part
�Index to Thomas Scott's Publications.
iv
Price.
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MAOFIE, MATT.
Religion Viewed
Universe
as
-
Devout Obedience to the Daws
-
-
-
-
of the
-
- 0 G
MAITLAND, EDWARD.
Jewish Literature and Modern Education; or, the Use and Abuse
-
of the Bible in the Schoolroom
-
-
- 1 6
- 0 6
- 0 6
Revelation -
- 0 6
-
How to Complete the Reformation. With Portrait
The Utilisation of the Church Establishment
-
M.P., Letter by.
The Dean of Canterbury
on
Science
and
NEALE, EDWARD VANSITTART.
Does Morality depend on Longevity ?
- 0 6
Genesis Critically Analysed, and continuously arranged; with Intro
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-
-
-
-
-
The Mythical Element in Christianity The New Bible Commentary and the Ten Commandments
-10
- 1 0
-03
NEWMAN, Professor F. W.
Against Hero-Making in Religion
- o 6
James and Paul .
-00
Letter on Name Christian. (See Abbot) On the Causes of Atheism With Portrait - 0 6
On the Relations of Theism to Pantheism; and On the Galla
Religion
-06
Reply to a Letter from an Evangelical Lay Preacher
- 0 3
The Bigot and the Sceptic
- 0 6
The Controversy about Prayer - 0 3
The Divergence of Calvinism from Pauline Doctrines
- 0 3
The Religious Weakness of Protestantism
- 0 7
The True Temptation of Jesus. With Portrait
- 0 6
Thoughts on the Existence of Evil
- 0 3
OLD GRADUATE.
Remarks
on
Paley’s Evidences -
-
-
-
- 0 6
-
- 0 6
OXLEE, the Rev. JOHN.
A Confutation of the Diabolarchy
-
-
PADRE OF THE ESTABLISHED CHURCH.
The Unity
of the
Faith among
all
Nations
-
-
- 0 6
-
-
- 0 6
PARENT AND TEACHER, A.
Is Death the end of all things for Man ?
PHYSICIAN, A.
by way of Catechism,—Religious, Moral, and
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-
-
-
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PRESBYTER ANGLICANUS.
Eternal Punishment. An Examination of the Doctrines held by the
Clergy of the Church of England
-
-
The Doctrine of Immortality in its Bearing
-
on
ROBERTSON, JOHN, Coupar-Angus.
Intellectual Liberty
The Finding of the Book -
ROW, A. JYRAM.
Christianity
and
-
-
-
Education in India.
St George’s Hall, London, Nov. 12,1871
-
-
Education
- 0 6
0 6
o 6
-20
A Lecture delivered at
0 6
�Index to Thomas Scott’s Publications.
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SCOTT, THOMAS.
Basis of a New Reformation
-09
Commentators and Hierophants; or, The Honesty of Christian
Commentators. In Two Parts. 6d. each Part
-
1 0
-
-
Miracles and Prophecies -06
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-06
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- 0 6
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- 0 6
The English Life of Jesus. A New Edition
- 4 4
The Tactics and Defeat of the Christian Evidence Society - 0 6
STATHAM, F. REGINALD.
Rational Theology. A Lecture
-
-
-
-
- 0 3
STRANGE, T. LUMISDEN, late Judge of the High Court of Madras.
A Critical Catechism. Criticised by a Doctor of Divinity, and
Defended by T. L. Strange
- 0 6
Clerical Integrity
-03
Communion with God
-03
The Bennett Judgment
-03
The Bible; Is it “The Word of God?”
0 6
The Speaker’s Commentary Reviewed
2 6
SZMONDS, J. ADDINGTON.
The Renaissance
of
Modern Europe
-
-
-
03
-
TAYLOR, P. A., M.P.
Realities
--------
VOYSEY, The Rev. CHARLES.
A Lecture on Rationalism
A Lecture on the Bible An Episode in the History
On Moral Evil
-
-
of
-
-
-
-
-
-
- 0 6
-06
Religious Liberty. With Portrait 0 6
-
-06
W. E. B.
An Examination
of
Some Recent Writings
about Immortality
- 0 6
WHEELWRIGHT, the Rev. GEORGE.
Three Letters on the Voysey Judgment and the Christian
Evidence Society’s Lectures - 0 6
WILD, GEO. J., LL.D.
Sacerdotalism
-
«
-
0 6
WORTHINGTON, The Rev. W. R.
On the Efficacy of Opinion in Matters of Religion -06
Two Essays : On the Interpretation of the Language, of The Old
Testament, and Believing without Understanding - 0 6
ZERFFI, G. G., Ph.D.,
Natural Phenomena and their Influence on Different Religious Systems 0 3
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The Souls of
the
-
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On
the
Historical Depravation
of
Christianity
PHYSICIAN, A.
The Pentateuch, in Contrast with the Science and Moral Sense of our
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-
-
-
-06
STRANGE, T. LUMISDEN, late Judge of the High Court of Madras.
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The Resurrection -
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-
-
.
-03
-03
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-
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-
-
-0 6
CANTAB, A.
Jesus versus Christianity
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- 0 9
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Is Jesus God?
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Illusion and Delusion
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Victorian Blogging
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A collection of digitised nineteenth-century pamphlets from Conway Hall Library & Archives. This includes the Conway Tracts, Moncure Conway's personal pamphlet library; the Morris Tracts, donated to the library by Miss Morris in 1904; the National Secular Society's pamphlet library and others. The Conway Tracts were bound with additional ephemera, such as lecture programmes and handwritten notes.<br /><br />Please note that these digitised pamphlets have been edited to maximise the accuracy of the OCR, ensuring they are text searchable. If you would like to view un-edited, full-colour versions of any of our pamphlets, please email librarian@conwayhall.org.uk.<br /><br /><span><img src="http://www.heritagefund.org.uk/sites/default/files/media/attachments/TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" width="238" height="91" alt="TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" /></span>
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Is Jesus God? a sermon preached on Trinity Sunday, at the Free Christian Church, Croydon, near London
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Suffield, Robert Rodolph
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Place of publication: London
Collation: 24, v. [1] p. ; 18 cm.
Notes: Part of Morris Miscellaneous Tracts 4 and the library of Dr Moncure Conway. Publisher's list on numbered pages at the end. Printed by G.W. Reynell, Little Pulteney Street, Haymarket, London. Includes 8 pages of notes.
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1873
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CT122
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Jesus Christ
God
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Conway Tracts
Jesus Christ
Morris Tracts
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“®hp I became a llnifarxan,”
BY
R. RODOLPH SUFFIELD.
THIRD THOUSAND.
�252 < l>
®lvn $ becanw a Stmtanan:
A DISCOURSE
BY THE
REV. R. RODOLPH SUFFIELD,
Of Reading, Berks;
DELIVERED IN THE UNITARIAN CHAPEL,
KENDAL,
On AUGUST 2ist, 1881,
And Published at the request of the Congregation.
§Unl)al:
Printed
by
Bateman
and
Hewitson, StrAmongate.
Price Twopence.
�liM irillirt I t
�“ WHY I BECAME A UNITARIAN.”
■“ The hour cometh, and now is, when the true worshippers
shall worship the Father in spirit and truth ; for such doth the
Father seek to be his worshippers. God is a spirit, and they
that worship him must worship in spirit and truth. ”
Johniv., 23, 24.
H Y I became a Unitarian ?” I will endeavour
to reply to that question, as well as I can,
in a single discourse. By the word Unitarian I
designate a Theist in the line of the Hebrew and
Christian tradition.
There are Evangelical Theists, Roman Catholic
Theists, Mahomedan Theists; there are Theists of
various Sects, Religions, and Schools of Thought;
there are Poly-theists, Trinitarian Theists, Christian
Theists.
Speaking accurately and philosophically, I am a
Cosmic-Theist. I am a Theist — i.e. I believe that
there is Divine Thought pervading and guiding the
universe—that Divine Thought we call Theos—God.
I adore God, I revere God, I trust in God, the
Supreme Power of the Universe; I hope in God, the
Supreme Beneficence; I trustfully hold filial spiritual
communion with God, the paternal, fostering soul of
the universe. Thus I am a Theist.
I am a Cosmic Theist. The word cosmic is the
adjective of the Greek word cosmos, which means the
totality—the universal whole as a progressive unity.
The word implies an orderly progression ; a combined,
continuous unity — always growing, always one.
Unity betwixt the past and the present.
Unity
under one thought, one law. Unity and growth —•
�6
Why I became a Unitarian.
oneness and development in the past, the present, and
the future.
I am a Cosmic Theist. I adore God, the soul of
this ever developing cosmos, the fostering spirit of
this one ever growing totality to which we belong.
Thus my religion is as universal as the universe.
But to descend from the universe to this little
planet, and to the race of man, the richest in endow
ments upon this earth.
I believe in the unity of mankind—that all men,
everywhere, are sons of God; i.e. are in spiritual com
munion with God, loved by God, cared for by God,
and to be for ever cared for by God and loved by Him.
Thus I believe in the unity between God and man.
I believe in the unity between man and man. A
unity, no sect, or church, or priesthood, or oppression,
or anathema can destroy. I believe in the unity
between God and nature—the unity between nature
and man. I believe in the unity of all religions and
sects and nationalities, for all are embraced in the
bosom of universal humanity. I believe in the unity
existing between the past and the present and the
future—collectively and individually. Thus I believe
in the one-ness, the unity of effects throughout the
entire duration of each individual life, in this and in
every future life; in the unity of action; the unity of
cause and effect; that our actions, whether evil or
good, foolish or wise, must ever, as part of the whole,
necessarily effect our future. Thus I believe in the
the unity of the law of retribution. Seeing everywhere
the unity of the divine plans, the unity of the divine
thought, I believe in the future development of this
same unity of plan.
I can see God in His effects, in his mode of work
ing, in the unity of his thought; but I cannot define,
or explain, or understand God’s nature, essence, or
mode of being.
�Why I became a Unitarian.
7
When I was a Roman Catholic I accepted, upon
the authority of the Church, the creeds explaining
God, and declaring that besides the Paternal Spirit,
there are two other Gods, one called Jesus Christ, and
the other called the Holy Ghost.
When, during the years 1868, 1869, and 1870,
there arose the grave deliberation within the Roman
Catholic Church as to where the infallible power
exists—whether in the episcopate dispersed or collected
—whether in all the faithful, or whether only in the
Bishops combined with the Pope, or whether in the
Pope alone—I gradually and reluctantly arrived at
the conviction that infallibility does not exist anywhere
amongst men. That all knowledge grows. That
religious knowledge—that the knowledge of God’s
laws, like all other knowledge, grows—that growth
greatly dependent upon our earnestness in the pursuit
of knowledge.
That to make a creed and fix it as an unmovable
law to bind successive generations of teachers and re
ligionists, is a violation of the spiritual law of our
being.
That liberty in religion is as essential as
liberty in science and in art—that it must grow like
the flowers, with light, and warmth, and space.
Thus, as a Cosmic Theist, I perceived that I must
worship God in isolation, unless I could find worship
pers who accept liberty and growth as essential con
ditions of their union and co-operation.
The infallibility of the Bible was as clearly a fiction
as the infallibility of the Pope.
The books of the Bible are valuable because they
record not stagnation but growth—growth through
many changing forms of error interwoven with all
portions of that book.
To pervert the Bible into an immovable creed,
would be to subvert truth and the nature of things.
To pervert any great teacher into a final and infallible
�8
Why I became a Unitarian.
teacher, would be to insult his memory—and from
having been a blessed helper to degrade him into a
perpetual obstructor.
I could be the loving and faithful disciple of Christ
and of St. Paul in the spiritual truths they taught and
illustrated, but not in the mistakes which they inherited
or transmitted as men.
With such convictions, where could I find places
of worship based on principles essentially true, and
sure to contain numerous sympathetic souls? All
the churches and sects, whether Roman, Anglican,
Presbyterian, Wesleyan, Evangelical—not to name
other smaller sects—impose upon their teachers condi
tions essentially opposed to the Divine law of growth.
They require of them an interior reception of state
ments as to religions and morals; nay, also as to the
origin of the world and of man, and command them
to harmonise their teachings and devotions to state
ments in many ways erroneous. The people who
attend such ministrations are in many cases formally
committed to the profession of antiquated and some
times injurious errors. When not formally committed,
they are substantially committed by acquiescence
under teachers bound, not only to the maintenance of
errors, but a groundwork of faith essentially false,
opposed to God’s conspicuous plan in the order of
nature.
When Milton had at length abandoned the popular
religious views of his countrymen, he found no place
of worship wherein he could honestly adore God, and
feeling how odious is hypocrisy, above all things in
religious matters, he worshipped in his own house.
Must such be my alternative? Happily for myself
not so. After Milton’s death, chapels were founded
at various times and places, wherein no conditions,
no form of creed, was imposed on minister or con
gregation. The trust deeds of those chapels declared
�Why I became a Unitarian.
9
them to exist “ for the worship of God; ” and some
times the clause was added—“ for the use of Protestant
dissenters.” No book, no creed, no teacher, no man
being superadded to neutralise and violate the law of
development, of growth. They could develope or
deteriorate, they could progress, they could retrogade,
they could perish. It was the law of nature, and
therefore divine in essential principles. The congre
gations worshipping in these unfettered chapels, passed
through many phases.
The most noticeable fact is that about 300 of them,
whilst commencing as orthodox Trinitarian, gradually
rose into Arianism, then semi-Arianism, then Socinianism, then Unitarianism. Thus I found existing
in my country some 300 congregations, still quite un
fettered, both as to minister and people; but at the
present time holding, in different phases, the Unitarian
Theology. Amongst them there were, I perceived,
various opinions as to the person and office of Christ,
as to the supernatural or natural position of Christ, of
Christianity, of the Bible; but I found them for the
most part loyally and gratefully pursuing the central
truth of their origin and co-operation, as worshippers
of God, free to follow their reason, their consciences,
and the holy law of Cosmic growth. Therein I re
cognised little groups of worshippers amongst whom
I could find a religious home.
My philosophic opinions as to cosmic growth,
cosmic unity, cosmic law, cosmic Theism, might be
only held by a few of those worshippers here and
there, but I perceived that my own philosophic con
victions harmonised with the essential principles on
which those religious societies were founded.
But negation of error is a supremely important
feature of truth, and I perceived that those religious
societies, though free in origin and in existence, and
as unfettered by creed now as ever—yet, for the time
�io
Why I became a Unitarian.
being, were composed of worshippers whose negations
were my own—and in consequence of the theology
generally flourishing among them, and therefore
guiding the free election of their minister, they were
popularly called “ Unitarian Chapels,” and their
ministers, “ Unitarian Ministers.” I perceived that
whilst the word “ Unitarian,” by popular parlance
common to them all, covered many shades of
divergence, yet there were negations of great import
ance beneficially and powerfully proclaimed by them
all—the very promulgation by them of those negations
of necessity emphasized great and universal truths.
Their denial of the justice of the imposition of creeds
on others, and on our successors, made them the
brave defenders of mental liberty.
But even that great fundamental principle would
not have justified me conscientiously or made me feel
peacefully happy in sharing their worship, unless
adequately sympathising with their negations—and
their negations were my own. They denied the
deity of Christ, they denied the personality of the Holy
Ghost, and therefore they denied the Trinity. They
denied the dogma of universal human corruption, of
damnation in an eternal hell, of priestly castes, of
priestly absolution, of sacramental efficacy.
They
denied the popular dogma of atonement by Christ’s
blood, and the scheme of redemption based upon that
figment. Thus, their very negations constituted them
the only consistent maintainers of the paternal char
acter of God, and the fraternal equality of man.
Their negation of creeds, as essential to God’s favour,
constituted them the special maintainers of the uni
versal truth, that righteousness is the true test, that
good men exist in all religions, that whilst opinions
must vary in consequence of the various degrees of
mental growth and knowledge, sincerity to erroneous
convictions can exist in the most opposing sects—a
�Why I became a Unitarian.
II
truly humane negation, and consequent truth; for
persons guided by it, proclaim not merely tolerance
toward those holding error, but perfect liberty, nay
honour to them when sincere and otherwise good.
Lastly, though I saw many Unitarians according to
the Bible and to Christ a position I deemed exaggerated
and erroneous, yet even with them I perceived an essen
tial bond of unity and agreement, inasmuch as they
always claimed for conscience and reason the mental
and moral supremacy over life and action. So I was not
forced to suffer the spiritual disadvantages of religious
isolation, for I could honestly and happily find amongst
Unitarian worshippers a religious home, and the
benefits of religious sympathy, and the consolations
of collective religious worship. And during eleven
years I have never regretted my choice. Religious
fellowship is always a blessing to oneself, but it is
moreover a benefit to others, to be enabled to invite
their attention to communities of worshippers wherein
the most philosophic and independent thinker can
co-operate without an hypocrisy and without an
equivocation—to chapels wherein children are taught
moral and sacred lessons, but always in harmony with
the highest attained truth—to chapels wherein the
various epochs of life and of its close, are sanctified
by acts of devotion not founded on the mythological
or interwoven with the superstitious.
Let not susceptible and timid souls apprehend in a
position so dignified and philosophic, a painful sever
ance from all the hallowed associations and memories
of the past. We believe in the evolution of religion,
not in the destruction of its substance. The Unitarian
Chapel is in the venerable line of the Christian tradi
tion, and the halo of ancient pieties surround it.
Whilst appreciating the Sacred Books of other
religions, we always read at our religious services from
�12
Why I became a Unitarian.
the Sacred Books, Jewish and Christian, whence our
higher faith has been evolved.
If we reject the patristic dogma of the Trinity, let
it be remembered that the word Trinity nowhere
exists in the Bible. That the only passage in the
New Testament wherein it was taught (i John v. 7)
has been ignomiously cast out of the revised version
as a deliberate fraud. If we reject the personality of
the Holy Ghost, and declare that the “ Holy Spirit ”
is an operation not a person, let it be remembered
that the orthodox dogma is nowhere affirmed in our
Sacred Books. If we reject the dogma of the deity
of Christ, we therein follow Christ, his Apostles, and
his mother, the declarations of his friends and of his
enemies. Christ said, “ To sit on my right hand and
on my left is not mine to give11 come not to do
my own will but the will of him that sent me,— I do
nothing of myself; ” “ Of that day knoweth no man,
nor the angels, neither the son, but my Father only
“The Father is greater than I;” “ I go to my God,
and your God; ” “ Remove from me this cup, never
theless not what I will but what Thou wilt; ” “ My
doctrine is not mine, but His that sent me; ” “I seek
not my own glory, but I honour my Father.” He
was a baby, suckled and nursed, he was a little boy,
was obedient to his parents, was taught and was
scolded by them. He was tempted, he prayed to
God, gave thanks to God, resigned himself to God,
was obedient to God. He taught his disciples to pray
to God, not even naming him. At the approach of
death he exclaimed, “ My God, my God why hast
thou forsaken me.” He would not even allow himself
to be called “ good,” declaring that epithet to befit
only God. His mother speaks of herself and Joseph
her husband as his parents, his father and his mother.
The revised version has, in obedience to ancient MSS.,
substituted “Father” for “Joseph,” thus emphasizing
�Why I became a Unitarian.
13
the relationship. All the language and actions
directed to Jesus and adopted by him, harmonize with
his position as the human born Messiah, never with
the possibility of his being God. The conduct of his
mother, brothers, disciples, and female friends after
his death, do not bear a trace of any notion entertained
that their deceased relative and friend was God. The
first utterances of disciples proclaiming the new religion
emphatically speak of Jesus as a “ man approved of
God.” Let anyone read the speeches of St. Stephen,
at his martyrdom, of St. Peter, at the first Pentecost,
of St. Paul, at Athens, and judge whether it is credible
that those men believed in the Deity of Christ, in
atonement from hell by his blood, in the patristic and
Evangelical scheme of redemption. Christ is spoken
of as having been criminally “ murdered.” If that
“ murder ” had not been committed, would mankind
have been lost in hell ? During the last 100 years,
Unitarian scholars have been proving that the few
stray passages adduced to suggest the Deity of Christ,
disappear as evidential: some are spurious, some are
mistranslations, some are perverted by punctuation,
some have words changed or interpolated, some are
merely Judaic expressions suitable to the Messiah, or
Platonic expressions applied by the contemporaneous
Jew Philo to any great man. Thus Dr. Doddridge
declared that the text on which he rested the Deity of
Christ, and which kept him from embracing the Uni
tarian Theology, was Rev. i, 11, wherein the expres
sion, “ I am Alpha and Omega, the first and the last,”
is applied to Christ In the revised version, the text
drops out as spurious, it is only to be found in passages
wherein God the Father is spoken of. In 1 Tim. iv.
8, “ God,” as applied to Christ, becomes “ he who was
manifested in the flesh.” Acts xx, 28, “ Church of
God ” becomes, in marginal reading, “ Church of the
Lord.” Jude 4, 11 Denying the only Lord God,” be-
�14
Why I became a Unitarian.
comes “Denying our only Master.” Jude 29, “To
the only wise God our Saviour,” becomes “To the
only God our Saviour, through Jesus Christ be glory.”
Similarly such passages as Rom. ix. 5, Phil. ii. 6, lose
in the revised version any evidential bearing upon the
Deity of Christ. Unitarian scholarship has triumphed
almost all along the line, and in a few more years, it
will be found that the much abused Unitarian
Theologians are correct in the matters not yet con
ceded. Already the word “ atonement ” drops out of
the New Testament in its revision; and the passages
alluding to the shedding of Christ’s blood assume now
an aspect not calculated to maintain the popular dogma.
Three hundred years ago it was thought shocking,
when Luther denied to St. Paul the authorship of the
Epistle to the Hebrews, and attributed it to Apollos.
Now no scholar of note attributes that epistle to the
Apostle; and most critics urge that “St. John’s
Gospel” was written, not by an Apostle, but as late
as a.d. 135-150, probably by John of Ephesus.
If Christ’s body had been (as some Unitarians in
common with our orthodox brethren suppose) mir
aculously raised from the tomb and lifted up to heaven,
it would no more prove his Deity, than when similar
incidents were attributed to Elias and others; but it
is deserving of notice that the revised version suggests
that the very portions of the Gospel narrating Christ’s
ascension are spurious, are interpolations.
However, let us turn from technical controversies
to the ever unfolding teaching of the universe and of
humanity. Let us realise the great precepts of Christ,
“ the love of God and the love of man; ” let us
realise his thought that “ our neighbour ” is not merely
our countryman or co-religionist, but our brother, man
everywhere, whether Roman Catholic or Atheist,
Moslem or Zulu, Buddhist or Evangelical, Unitarian
or Brahmin, Agnostic or Jew. “Be good and do
�Why I became a Unitarian.
15
good; ” “ advance human knowledge; ” “ promote
human liberty; ” “ foster human happiness.”
Such great human principles I found in the front
among the Unitarian free churches, and after eleven
years I can still cordially repeat the expression I
uttered regarding them when first I sought amidst
their friendly fellowship the privileges of religious
worship: —
After long and deep thought, study, prayer, and counsel, I
decided that it would be impossible for me honestly to continue
to act as a priest. The infallibility of the Pope, and, of the
Scriptures, alike, I question, and the dogmas resting solely on
either of those authorities, I am not able on that account to
admit.
It is my desire to unite with others, and to assist them in the
worship of God, and in the practice of the two-fold precepts of
charity, unfettered by adhesion on either side, to anything,
beyond those great fundamental principles as presented to us
by Jesus Christ.
Having understood that those who are commonly called
Unitarians, Free Christians, or Christian Theists, thus agree in
the liberty inspired by self-diffidence, humility, and charity, to
carry on the worship of God, without sectarian requirements or
sectarian opposition ; that they possess a simple but not vulgar
worship, a high standard of virtue, intelligence, and integrity;
and these after the Christian type, moulded by the Christian
traditions, and edified by the sacred Scriptures ; holding the
spirit taught by Jesus Christ, and the great thoughts by virtue
of which he built up the ruins of the moral world ; and yet not
enforcing the reception of complicated dogmas as a necessity,
or accounting their rejection a crime : a communion of Christian
worshippers, bound loosely together, and yet by the force of
great principles enabled quietly to maintain their position, to
exercise an influence elevating and not unimportant, and to
present religion under an aspect which thoughtful men can
accept without latent scepticism, and earnest men without the
aberrations of superstition, or the abjectness of mental servi
tude to another—such approved itself to my judgment, and
commended itself to my sympathy.
With those religionists possessing no creed but God
and Liberty, Benevolence and Progress, you can think
and learn and be mentally free, and yet enjoy the
�16
Why I became a Unitarian.
blessings of religious communion with your fellowmen.
Then religion will be a joy and not an anathema, an
inspiration, not a bond. It will stimulate to all forms
of human knowledge, to all the beneficence of human
progress. It will enable you to realize that law is a
growth, that right and wrong exist in the nature of
things—that there is one supreme virtue—the effort to
promote happiness ; one supreme sin—selfishness. Let
the mythologies go—we will serve them no more—we
will rise out of sectarian creeds into humanity, and
only be anxious during this short life to love and to
serve others, and to strive to make them wiser and
happier. —Amen.
�
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Why I became a Unitarian: a discourse ... delivered in the Unitarian Chapel, Kendal, on August 21st, 1881
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Text
VATICAN DECREES
AND
THE “EXPOSTULATION.”
BY
ROBERT RODOLPH SUFFIELD,
Minister of the Free Christian Church, Wellesley Road, Croydon; formerly
Apostolic Missionary and Prefect of the "Guard of Honour,"
Author of several Pamphlets in this Series.
PUBLISHED BY TRUBNER AND
57 AND 59 LUDGATE HILL ; AND
CO.,
THOMAS SCOTT,
11 THE TERRACE, FARQUHAR ROAD, UPPER NORWOOD, LONDON, $.E.
1874.
Price Sixpence.
�LONDON:
PRINTED BY C. W. BEYNELL, 16 LITTLE PULTENEY STREET,
HAYMARKET, W.
�PREFACE.
Since the appearance of Mr. Gladstone’s “ Expos
tulation,” I have been repeatedly asked to express my
opinions as to the political bearing of the Vatican
decrees. The subject is of an extent and complication
beyond the limits of a pamphlet; but as some friends
are partial enough to urge me to make known, at
least in a general way, something of the result of my
thoughts and experience, I can no longer consistently
maintain the silence which I should prefer. Though
after the thoughtful and accurate statements which
have emanated from Mr. Gladstone, Lord Acton,
Lord Camoys, the Right Rev. Monsignore Capel, the
Very Rev. Monsignore Patterson, and the able com
ments upon the same in our leading periodicals, I
have little to add beyond the expression of my per
sonal experience ; the quotations, which at the request
of the same parties are appended to this brochure,
will explain to strangers my profound personal inte
rest in a question which has so intimately affected
my own life.
��THE VATICAN DECREES
AND
THE “EXPOSTULATION.”
EOPLE cannot be allowed the pleasure of at the
same time affirming and denying a conviction.
The Neo-Catholics, headed by the Pope, and in
England by Archbishop Manning, declare the Vatican
decrees to be an undoubted expression of the Divine
will. The Old Catholics, represented by such men
as Bishop Reinkins, Dr. Dollinger, and Lord Acton,
declare them to be merely the utterances of what
Dr. Newman designated “ au aggressive and insolent
faction.” The Vatican Council is either ecumenic or
schismatic. Skilful men can find reasons on either
side, and consistent men may act out either conclu
sion. The Old Catholics deny the infallibility of
the Vatican Council. The Neo-Catholics affirm its
infallibility. Learning has ranged itself on the side
of the “ Old ” Catholics; diplomacy on the side of the
“ New.” The Roman Catholic Church has disappeared;
the Vatican Church has supplanted it. We have
too much appreciation of the learning of the “ Old ”
Catholics, and the diplomatic ambition of the ecclesi
astical rulers of the “ New,” to be able to regard as a
nonentity that momentous revolution. When men
the wealth of whose virtues and learning had enriched
the Papal cause could, in advanced years, sorrow
fully permit the Pope and some millions of adherents
to leave them, at once warning and anathematized—
P
�4
The Vatican Decrees
warning those who leave, anathematized by those
who have left;—when acute diplomatists like Dr. Man
ning urge on a revolution with all the ardour
inspired by ambition, and in presence of the sorrow
ful laments and pathetic warnings of men who had
grown old in the service of a cause then about to
die,—surely a nonentity was just the last event
contemplated by anyone. The Old Catholics and
New Catholics alike beheld in that revolution the
inauguration of a new era of individual absolutism,
to be established as the embodiment of the Divine
will; and in the name of religion, of liberty, of
humanity, the Old Catholics raised their protest. In
the name of Pius IX. and of possession, the New
Catholics raised the war cry, which died off into
a perpetual anathema. Those men who contended
on the battle-field of thought, of history, of diplo
macy, until the fatal victory of July, 1870, were not
children contending for baubles : they were men who
entered the lists. Some contended for truth, others
fought for power. The triumphant faction being in
possession of the Vatican, in possession of the
Episcopal Sees, in the possession of the ecclesiastical
edifices, retained easily power over the masses. What
they sought, they have obtained. Whenever their
chief ruler issues any declaration which he means to
be infallible, it is infallible. Should any voice,
retaining a ring of the accents of liberty, dare to say,
“ The subject on which you have decreed is out of
the range of faith and morals, so you only therein
decree as a man;” the Ruler replies, “You have
accepted as Divine the Vatican decrees; you therein
declared that you will be accursed, and forfeit your
■eternal salvation, unless you inwardly believe ai;d
heartily accept, and outwardly in practice conform to
that belief, that the jurisdiction of the Roman Pontiff
is over all the Faithful individually and collectively;
that his authority compels your entire and unreserved
�and the “Expostulation.”
5
obedience, not only in matters appertaining to faith
and morals, but also in all those that appertain to the
discipline and government of the Church. You.
have declared your internal assent to the Divine
decree, whereby you learn that this power is from
God, represents God, is full and supreme, and not
merely of inspection and direction ; that it is superior
to all other power, extends everywhere, must never
be controlled, must always enjoy free and immediate
communication with its subjects wherever they may
be; that its judgments may never be reviewed, appealed
against, or disregarded; that to it alone it apper
tains to declare what belongs to its jurisdiction and
what domains of thought and of action (if any) are
exempt from its infallible utterances.”
Obviously the Vatican faction could not regard as
meaningless and powerless such expressions, cau
tiously worded and decreed after mature deliberation.
Their promulgation was enjoined. The Vatican party
must not be surprised if those who protested against
their formation desire their promulgation. What can
be done, what was meant to be done, what will be
done, we want all men to know ! Vatican diplomacy,
having obtained the weapons, would rather that the
Faithful alone, and they but gradually, should realise
the weight of the sceptre which they have forged and
feebly yielded to an Italian priest. But we would
rather know and feel the metal of the weapon pre
pared for us. A sword sheathed in velvet is still a
sword. Chains concealed in the intentions of a pre
late, still are chains. They are meant for us, and we
should like to handle them. We have been recently
somewhat naively told that they will be “ convenient.”
Doubtless ; therefore the more that is known about
them the better. In a docile school the boys collect
the birch rods, and with wondering fear feel their
substance, and speculate on their effects. If the scholars
become too frightened, should panic threaten an in
�6
'The Vatican Decrees
convenient outbreak, the master and ushers will pru
dently explain that the rods will be hardly ever used;
that they are merely symbols of authority, quite
harmless, almost pleasant; that obviously it can make
no difference whether the rods are in the school-room
or on the trees ; they were only gathered at the urgent
request of the boys. All very good ; but still a boy
might like to know that they are there, are meant to
be u-ed, and will be used.
In former times we English people knew what the
Popes could effect amongst those who revered in him
a Divine primacy, but not a Divine individual, irre
sponsible infallibility. What is prepared for us now,
when the Papal authority is declared to be absolute,
immediate, personal—when his utterances must be
believed as well as obeyed ? Now that a circle of hell
fire is drawn around the Papal subject, he must either,
like the Salamander, kill his mental liberty, or live for
ever in the flames. People have said, Why in this
country, at a time of profound peace, when all the
Vatican Catholics are living in undoubted loyalty—
why call attention to the Vatican decrees when they
are consoling Roman prelates and harming no one ?
We reply, It is just the time when we should examine
the weapons forged for emergencies. If the English
people were in times of excitement to realise the mag
nitude of the triumphant revolution, we cannot tell to
what excesses some amongst them might be driven.
Those principles of religious equality which we have
been slowly conquering by the patient energy of men
whose passion is for justice might have been pushed
back for generations into the dregs of a cowardly and
insane persecution. All men, of whatever creed,
Roman or the opposite, ought to rejoice that this sub
ject should have been brought to the front and can
vassed at a moment when it appeals to no triumphant
bigotries. I am convinced that nothing can better
secure our Roman countrymen in England than what
�and the 11 Expostulation
7
is now taking place. Let all men realise what must
and ought to be the line of action of a consistent sup
porter of tlie Vatican Church, as contrasted with the
position of the Old Catholics; let all men, having rea
lised it, know what to expect; let all then renew within
their minds the intense conviction that under no cir
cumstances whatsoever must opinions be punished;
that the State has only to deal with actions, and
amongst actions only with those which obviously
affect the commonwealth ; then we shall be strong to
resist and to suppress that hurricane of anti-Roman
indignation which will sooner or later arise, and which
might carry away many of our great principles of
liberty, if we were not prepared to meet it by a recog
nition of the causes exciting it.
No controversialist could have caught the public
ear and instructed the public mind. The foremost
man in England alone could do it; the statesman,
rich in scholarship and in thought, representing in
his own person whatever is the highest in culture,
the most illustrious in our national traditions, the
most reverent, religious, and tolerant in character;
he, the near relative of one Roman Catholic, the inti
mate friend of many, was, above all others, the man
to speak. Judging by the standard of expediency,
his words may politically injure him; judging by the
standard of rectitude, his Expostulation ” will be
recorded amongst the most honourable deeds of an
honourable career. Many will have cause to rejoice
at it; but, above all, must we, the disciples of Reli
gious Equality, rejoice that the people of England
should have been instructed in the words and bearing
of the Vatican Decrees when that instruction could
be received quietly, take its place in the public mind
harmlessly and prepare us against contingencies
wisely.
As to explanations, there are none to give.
Some Roman Catholics, like Sir George Bowyer,
�8
The Vatican Decrees
may not as yet understand the Decrees, and may,
in consequence of their known spirit of submission,
be allowed to write condemned propositions publicly,
trusting to their private repentance in the Con
fessional. But the common sense of the people of
England will easily perceive that the question is not
whether now the Pope may be enforcing loyalty or
not, but what all consistent subjects of the Vatican
Church must do when the Pope may enforce another
course. Regarding that, there can be no question.
Catholics will divide between those who accept the
Vatican Decrees and those who reject them; the
latter will practically be in the same position as all
the Episcopal Churches, independent of Rome, e.g.,
the Greek, Russian, English, American, and German.
In saying that, we can easily surmise the future
action of Neo-Catholics as to Papal Decrees hostile
to our national interests. I do not mean to state that
their constant obedience to the Pope can be always
depended upon by him. Men do not always act in
accordance with their convictions, even under pain of
certain eternal damnation. But we must not forget
that no Neo-Catholic can approach the Sacraments if
he be engaged in any line of action forbidden by the
Pope ; and all Catholics deem the Sacraments essen
tial to salvation ; moreover, disobedience to the Pope
in a grave matter would be understood to be invariably
a mortal sin. A soldier dying in a forbidden service
knows that he perishes for ever in Hell. It may be
said, practically, the Pope will probably not frequently
interfere—that will depend—one fact let us remem
ber, the Pope does not show much interest in matters
of merely personal or public virtue—he seldom thinks
it worth his while to issue a Decree against drunk
enness and such like faults. When dignified eccle
siastics in this country have taken up such merely
moral questions, it has been well known that it has
been chiefly to prevent the cause falling into the
�and the “ Expostulation ”
9
exclusive hands of Protestants. But the questions
connected with Papal power have never been allowed
to sleep. During the last years, Roman Catholics have
felt as if all religion and morality depended upon the
success of Papal political schemes. All the action of
the Pope has been to concentrate power in himself,
and to make it daily felt. His chief representatives
in England and Ireland have been appointed by the
Pope, in defiance of the wishes of the Paithful and
their clergy, and without the concurrence of one single
national vote. Regulations of a most arbitrary cha
racter as to marriage and education have been insti
tuted and enforced, in opposition to the wishes, in
terests and customs of the Faithful concerned.
It rends one’s memories to think of the noblehearted Roman Catholics of England, representatives
of ancient traditions of religion and of loyalty, their
lives as blameless and as beautiful as the poetic
legends of their Faith—they truthfully, through their
vicars apostolic, disowned all those Papal claims
which though often advanced and often recognised,
were not those “ Of Faith ”—on the strength of their
honest disclaimer they were restored to rights which
they ought never to have lost, and all the Liberals of
England rejoiced on that day when, in the Palace of
Westminster, the Roman Catholic nobles re-entered
the ancient hall, on each side of which the peers arose
to greet, them, the bearers of historic names, the re
presentatives of great traditions,—a principle greater
than all traditions arose and bade them welcome—it
was the principle of Religious Equality ! What have
those men done, to use the eloquent plaint of Dr.
Newman, that the hearts of the just should be made
sad ? Rome, ever reckless of honour when power can
be grasped ! what was it to Rome, that these sons of
crusaders and of martyrs had, on the strength of her
silence, plighted a word higher than the word of any
creed—the word of an English gentleman—and by
�IO
The Vatican Decrees
that word disowned and denied all the usurped pre
tensions of Rome. When the convenient time
arrived, a power that has never kept its word, com
pelled English gentlemen to violate theirs, to recant
all that they had said—it was the very triumph of the
Priest over the Man!—like the tyrant general who
seduced the honour of a virgin, and then presented to
her dishonoured gaze the corpse of the father she had
fondly hoped to have saved. The Roman Catholic
gentlemen yielded their honour to save their Church
—the Pope has presented to them as a corpse the
Church for which they interceded.
It is idle to point to the deeds of English Roman
Catholics in the days of old. In July, 1870, Italian
Priests and their coadjutors slew the old Church, and
intoned over it the Requiem. You find that Requiem
in the Vatican Decrees. Formerly, in periods of
discord, many Roman Catholics always sided with
the Pope, because they revered the primacy of his
dignity, the sacredness of his origin, and recognised
him as the centre of the Church’s unity ; other Roman
Catholics disobeyed him, resisted him, besieged his
capital, and yet, approaching the Sacraments, lived
and died in union with the Roman Church and its
creed, but resisting as exaggerated, or criminal, or
unpatriotic, actions and commands of the Roman
Pontiff. All that is past. The Pope was not
satisfied with the willing service of the free—some
to obey, others to oppose—and yet all to be one
with him in Faith and Sacraments. Those mystic
rites, tokens of spiritual memories, must wait
upon diplomacy, and be subject to his temporal
ambitions. Have all, or none. No wonder that in
many an English Roman Catholic home—many an
old Lome of chivalry, faith, and honour—a sorrowful
choice presented itself; accustomed to regard visible
unity with the Pope as essential to salvation, some
accepted the Papal Sacraments and slavery, others
�and the “Expostulation.”
11
sought Free Sacraments and personality, and in so
seeking they deemed the “ Free ” more Christian, more
Catholic than the “ Papal.” The men on each side
we honour, but let us not amidst our sentiments of
homage to conscientiousness—nay, may I add, to
memory and to affection—let us not forget that the
Catholics, divided now into the Vatican and the Old,
represent different principles, opposing positions.
The Vatican faction has triumphed, and has suc
ceeded in establishing all the principles the most
fatal to the development of the human mind, of
human society, of religion, of morals, of science, of
rational liberty. There is no explaining away what
has been done—either embrace it or disown it. Mr.
Gladstone’s “Expostulation ” may display to view a
few of those on either side. But the side taken is
really to be easily discovered by a more obvious test.
Who receives Sacraments from a Neo-Catholic priest ?
Who refuses so to do ? The statements in Mr. Glad
stone’s “ Expostulation ” are so cautiously accurate,
that I need only refer to them; but we must remem
ber that the Vatican Decree is retrospective. The
“ Encyclical ” has become a compendium of articles
of faith ; and every cause dear to a patriot and a
man of justice is cursed by its inhuman decrees.
You mock us with Italian irony, when in the presence
of the civilised world you first solemnly anathematise
science, civilisation, progress, and equal rights, when
you refuse your Sacraments and paternal fellowship
to those who cannot mentally believe the truth or
justice of your anathemas. When you declare that
those who cannot worship with you have no right to
worship anywhere; have, in fact, no rights outside the
walls of a prison or the steps of a scaffold, to which
you declare that your Church has divine power to
commit them; and then, when we read your decrees
and your admonition to civil governors to aid their
execution, and we read your own solemn utterances
�12
The Vatican Decrees
and tremble for the liberties which may be subjected
to your keeping—the liberty of the individual, the
liberty of the family, the liberty of the State, the
liberty of education, of science, of conscience—and
deliberate how we can preserve our liberty and
honour without violating yours, you assume the air of
injured innocence and wonder that we should call
attention to what really meant nothing at all, but
that, as we seem annoyed, you will put your heads
together, give us a nice explanation—a pill so care
fully sugared that even a Cardinal could swallow it.
But we say, we have had your explanations, you
thought about them well enough, you have promul
gated them to the world, we will learn your mind
from the words which you say are inspired—the
words of your Encyclicals and Vatican Decrees—not
from words which you can repudiate as soon as they
have succeeded in blinding. The indignant mind of
Europe has caught you “in flagrante delicto,” and
you turn round with a surprised smile and tell us you
meant no harm; you have taken bigotry, and into
lerance, and arrogance into your counsels, and com
bined together in a conspiracy against humanity—we
detect you, and you say, “ be quiet—what have we
done ? ” You send over your prelates to this England
of ours, and they talk glibly about liberty of worship,
and liberty of conscience, and liberty of speech, and
liberty of the press, and liberty of education, and
liberty of investigation, when they know—and now we
know—that they mean liberty for their own worship,
conscience, speech, education and press, but ana
themas against any one who dares even to think that
such liberty ought to belong to others. You forget
that our passionate devotion to the liberties you
anathematise are alone the cause why the Liberals of
England, headed by their great Statesman, declare
—“ Your equal liberties shall remain inviolate, by
virtue of the very principles you declare to be
�and the “Expostulation ”
13
accursed.” Having said that, and meaning to act
upon it, and determined not to be driven from it by
any foreign or domestic influence, we have surely
proclaimed all that the very chivalry of principle can
demand. But you can expect no more.
If a body of Puritans had existed in Rome in the
days of the Papal sovereignty; if they had in solemn
conclave declared that they regarded the Pope as
anti-Christ, and all his followers accursed by God and
to be repudiated by man, that no Roman Catholic
ought to be allowed any religious educational liberty—
that the Puritan conclave had a Divine right to extir
pate all such liberties—that it was the duty of the
civil power to enforce whatever action the aforesaid
conclave deemed prudent to enact, with the view of
forcibly destroying the existence of the Roman
Catholic religion—that Roman Catholics possess no
rights, but may be tolerated when toleration becomes
a regretable necessity. Suppose these Puritans to
have received civil rights because the Pope imagined
their principles of hostility to have merged into merely
religious and theoretical difference, the Puritans de
claring such to be the case, and repudiating the state
ments attributed to them which had been subversive
of civil loyalty ; supposing that a few years afterwards
these Roman Puritans met together, and declare that
all the opinions ever taught by their wildest divines
were part of the Gospel message; that they now
solemnly proclaim them as absolutely true, and held
firmly by all who join them ; that they have placed
themselves, for the protection of their principles,
under the control of the Emperor of Germany; that
at present they are perfectly satisfied with their posi
tion, and perfectly loyal. What would have been the
attitude of the Pope ? Prisons and scaffolds would
reply. But suppose the Pope to have been a secret
heretic, and, therefore, at liberty to follow the nobler
inspirations of conscience—suppose him to have an
unbounded confidence in the strength of his position
�14
The Vatican Decrees
and the final, though often remote, triumph of the
Right; but suppose him also to be a man capable of
appreciating what is demanded by self-respect and by
regard to the feelings of the loyal. What then would
have been his policy ? Would he have invited to his
more secret counsels Puritans known to maintain
the entire and universal supremacy of the German
Emperor ? Would he have recognised the Puritan
emissaries appointed by the Emperor for the super
vision of his Roman subjects, especially if the Em
peror had publicly claimed him as his own subject ?
Would he invariably have taken the dictation of the
German emissary as to the chaplains for the Roman
army and Roman prisons? Wbuld the citizens of
Rome have felt anxious to show special social con
sideration to the German emissary, whose chief func
tion it would be to keep the Puritans thoroughly
loyal to the Emperor, and ready to obey him when
ever occasion might demand ? If the Pope had so
acted in moments of weakness and romance, he would
have retraced his steps as soon as he recovered his selfrespect ; if a secret heretic, and so able to act nobly,
he would not begin to persecute the Puritans; he
would permit the Emperor to appoint his own emis
saries over the Puritan schools, Puritan institutions,
Puritan chapels, Puritan conclaves ; but he would not
permit the Emperor to appoint his own nominees to
public institutions, and then undertake to pay them ;
such refusal would not necessarily be the result of
fear, but of consistency and self-respect, and from a
conscientious desire not to encourage by favouritism the
further encroachments and pretensions of the German
Emperor. He would feel it due to his own subjects,
not to go out of his way to place in office of power
and of public trust those who continued obviously to
treat him as inferior to the Emperor. But if he
perceived other Puritans who maintained their inde
pendence of the decrees of the conclave, and though
�and the “Expostulation.”
T5
sympathising with the Emperor on account of simi
larity of creed, yet obviously regretting his claims to
supremacy in all causes over the Emperor, the Pope
would treat such Puritans like any other of his
subjects, without adverting in public action to their
difference of creed.
Such, I presume, ought to be our line of action
as to the foreign potentate who has recently claimed
supremacy over all the baptised amongst our country
men. We ought to ignore utterly and entirely all the
Papal claims, and Papal emissaries, as such. A Papal
Archbishop should be to us simply an English citizen,
or, if a foreigner, a f oreign visitor, and nothing more;
we ought not, on the ground of his being a Papal
prelate, to confer with him, and to arrange appoint
ments, or accept his appointments, and ask the wishes
of his foreign sovereign. To do so is contrary to
self-respect—to the national honour. If we had been
as anxious to consult the feelings and wishes of the
Irish people, and of the labouring classes of England,
as we have been anxious to defer to the wishes of an
Italian prelate, we should have but little discontent
in either country. Statesmen of large sympathies
have thought that they would be above all things
pleasing the English Roman Catholics and the Irish
people by finding out what would please the Pope,
and doing it. Oh, marvellous simplicity! Do not
the Irish remember full well that a Pope gave Ireland
to an English conqueror. That a Pope sent over a
Cardinal to help the English Government to suppress
national aspirations which were regarded with
apprehension at Rome ? Cardinal Cullen does not
enjoy the confidence of the Irish people; the prelate
they adore is the one who voted against the Papal
infallibility, an Archbishop whom the Pope would
depose if he dared. When he dies, he will probably
be succeeded by some docile canonist for^whom no
Irishman has voted. Dr. Cullen was appointed^by
�16
The Vatican Decrees
Rome without the concurrence of the Irish clergy.
His objects are of a very matron-like character, and
not at all representative of the wishes of the Irish
people. If we want to legislate with a view to the
wishes and feelings and real living interests of the
Irish people, we must not ask the guidance of any
Roman Cardinal. The Irish ask for national equality,
and we offer them a “concession” about the normal
schools, or invite a Papal prelate to meet a Princess,
and give him precedence over whatever might have
represented the national aspirations. The Irish
people ask for liberty, and you give them chaplains.
The Irish ask for extension of the franchise, repeal
of penal enactments, a national militia, and a local
Parliament, and you say we cannot do those things
for you, but we will pay your chaplains, and confer
with your venerated Bishops as to any other conces
sion they may deem desirable. I do not venture on
this occasion an opinion whether or not the real
wishes of the Irish people can be accepted or not; I
merely, for my present purpose say, if you want to
conciliate the Irish people you will not do so by fawn
ing upon the Pope and the clergy: they have their
objects; the Irish people have other objects. When
shall we give to nations the equal rights which we
more than give to the emissaries of a foreign power ?
Surely the loyalty of a nation is of more consequence
than the purchased conventional loyalty of a priest
hood.
But it may be said, anyhow in England, the way to
conciliate the gentry is to make much of the Papal
prelates. First of all I would say the English Roman
Catholic gentlemen needed no conciliation ; they were
loyal to the backbone; they had everything to lose
and nothing to gain by any change — any possible
change. When the Vatican Decrees were issued, about
two dozen men, distinguished by intellect, character,
and culture, refused submission, and thus virtually
�and the “Expostulation”
*7
assumed the position of “ Old Catholics,” like, for
instance, Lord Acton, the best-read Catholic in Eng
land. But most of the Catholics adopted the new
dogma. Thus the Roman Catholics recognised by
Catholic emancipation are now represented by only
a few honoured names, but very small in number,
probably such as Lord Camoys, Lord Acton, Petre,
Trevelyan, Simeon, Riddell, Oxenham, Thynne,
Wetherall, Hernans, Blenherhasset, Maskell, Charlton,
and some others. The Catholics who have embraced
the new Catholicism are numerous and submissive ;
they deserve our high personal admiration, for their
change, along with all their prelates, was most natural
to expect, and undoubtedly as conscientious on their
part as the action of the more learned of the laity who
remained “ Old Catholics.” But it must not be sup
posed that the New Catholics are, generally speaking,
grateful to Dr. Manning and the Papal faction for
the revolution brought, numerically, to so successful
an issue by their ecclesiastical tactics. English
Catholics have undoubtedly been more interested in
ecclesiastical matters than in political or national,
and thus they have been easily led over into the Papal
camp which their fathers renounced at the emancipa
tion ; but they inherit, along with all the old English
virtues, the old English contempt for Italian domina
tion. Our Government would have pleased English
Catholics better if there had been less courting of
ecclesiastics appointed by Rome, less seeking to carry
out mere ecclesiastical polity. Any one intimate with
the English Roman Catholic tone of thought must
be full well aware how bitterly English gentlemen
have bent beneath the yoke. It is worthy of note
that Dr. Manning was nominated Archbishop by the
Pope against the wish of the whole of the Diocesan
Chapter. Not one vote was given for him. The
English Roman Catholic families, grieved at his
appointment, knew what it meant, feared the results,
�i8
The Vatican Decrees
dreaded the priestly yoke and the papal absolutism ;
but, taught to submit, they did submit. It does not
follow that we need submit likewise. Truthfulness,
dignity, consistency, demand from us that we ignore
a Neo-Catholicism which we have never nationally
recognised. I am aware that for a time we may be
hampered by the grave political difficulty of being
bound to show special favour to the Episcopal Church
of England, and that the Neo-Catholics may
justly say, as you devote large sums of money to
promote worship and education, according to the
principles of Protestant or Ritualistic Anglicanism,
as the case may be, why should you not continue to pay
the Vicars Apostolic appointed by the Pope in some
of our colonies ? Why not continue the payment of
Neo-Catholic chaplains throughout India, in the Army,
and elsewhere ?—why not perpetuate for the promulga
tion of Neo-Catholicism the favour and the funds you
devoted for the Roman Catholicism which your Par
liament recognised ? Doubtless it is always difficult
to rise out of a false position ; but unless these anoma
lies are rectified, dangers await us far more serious
than the transient unpopularity obtained by touching
■existing abuses.
Protestants have not yet realised the momentous
character of the Revolution crowned at the Vatican.
No wonder; how could it be expected when intelli
gent Roman Catholics of lofty character and integrity,
like Lord Herries and Sir George Bowyer, do not
understand it ? I understand it, because as a Dominican
and theologian I studied the whole question during
the period of restless thought preceding the close of
the conflict in July, 1870. It was that study which
opened my eyes to the fallacy of the entire dogma of
infallibility. Heretofore, Roman Catholics were
only bound to believe in the infallibility of the
Church in union with the Pope and speaking through
the Pope. It was quite another question as to what
�and the 11 Expostulation.”
*9
•was needed to constitute an ex cathedra decree.
Some affirmed that no decree was infallible unless
issued in presence of a general council and with its
concurrence ; others affirmed that a decree was
proved to be ex cathedra when accepted by the
council dispersed; others affirmed that a decree was
ex cathedra if issued with great solemnity after
conferring with, and in union with, all the consul
tive congregations of the Roman Church. A Roman
Catholic vacillated amongst these views according to
the exigencies of history, conscience, common sense,
or controversy. The most opposing opinions could
be and were maintained by Bishops, scholars, and
laymen. But now the Vatican Decrees have declared
the Pope to be infallible whenever he intends to be
so, and on whatever subject he declares to fall within
the province of infallibility. Heretofore, the exercise
of the Papal power was limited in action as well as in
theory. National Churches and their Episcopate
disputed his decisions and refused to obey his
mandates. Those mandates could be only imposed
under peculiar circumstances, but the present Pope
has, during his long Pontificate, been concentrating
power in himself. He commenced by utilising the
prestige of his acknowledged position, and the
affection inspired by the kindness of his disposition :
but having attained an unprecedented power over all
National Churches through such means, he culminated
the strategy by first committing Bishops and the
Faithful everywhere to bombastic declarations as to
his divine and supreme prerogatives, and then taking
them at their word, and requiring the exaggerated
utterances of affectionate reverence to be formularised
into articles of faith. They were caught in the trap
they themselves had guilelessly fashioned. The Pope’s
well-known smile, half artful, half cheery, must have
welcomed the accomplishment of his long cherished
scheme. During the period of twenty years I was
�20
The Vatican Decrees
Apostolic Missioner throughout England and Ireland
I saw this power growing; we all dreaded it, for
we saw what an agency would be lodged in the
hands of a Pope abler than Pio Nono and less good,
yet what could we do ? The growing power was
not generally being used for criminal objects, it
was being exercised in England through eccle
siastics for the most part amiable and good. Thus
there was nothing suddenly done of a nature to
arouse and combine opposition; like the walls of the
Temple, the chains were forged amidst a silence only
disturbed by the reception of countless adulatory
addresses, and blessings, and indulgences prodigally
bestowed upon herds of people who listened to the
Holy Father as he repeated again and again the
story of his wrongs, his sufferings, his prerogatives,
and his similarity to Jesus Christ, after a fashion
which would have aroused the ludicrous in any minds
not sunk too low to be capable of appreciating the
ridiculous. But the result is far from being ludicrous.
The Pope has established over the millions of adhe
rents of the Vatican Church a two-fold tyranny-r
over every man, woman, and child, within his Church—
the absolutism of a teaching which may never be
even interiorly doubted; the absolutism of a rule
which may never be with impunity disobeyed. This
two-edged weapon hangs like the sword of Damocles
over every one who dares to think, to write, to act, to
rule, or to serve. At present, the Pope has only one
great object of anxiety—the recovery of his former
provinces—but hereafter other objects may arise.
But more than the political and national consequences
I do acutely mourn over the crushing mental and
moral effect of such an absolutism over all conscience,
all life, all energy, all thought. My intimate acquaint
ance with the personal excellence of English and
Irish Roman Catholics, lay, cleric, and conventual,
makes me deplore the more bitterly a despotism,
�and the 11 Expostulation."
21
which must gradually destroy all the higher develop
ments of character, and turn the descendants of the
fine old English Catholic families into abject Jesuit
ical serfs. In the name of God, may such never be.
Anyhow, may the people of England not expedite
that fall by the imprudence and injustice of a per
secution which would speedily unite those who may
otherwise partially dissolve ; or, on the other hand,
by the misleading encouragement of patronage and
compromise. We have no right to help minds and
consciences into a bondage which, when embraced,
separates the bondsman from humanity—the Church
with its theocracy on one side : Humanity with the
devil on the other side: such is the Papal concep
tion. And, alas ! the separation between the Papal
subject and Humanity is complete: the outward
tokens of courtesy or affection may be observed ; but
what love worth anything can exist between the
blessed and the accursed; what even are the ministra
tions of mercy, if they are so designed, as out of
men’s affections and afflictions to forge the rivets of
their servitude ?
When we cease the legislation of religious favourit
ism, and commence the legislation of religious equality
—when we treat all sects and institutions with justice,
and the members of all sects and institutions with
courtesy as well as justice—then shall we be in a
position to apply the principles of common sense to
conventual institutions. If the friends of conventual
institutions realised the wide-spread dislike engen
dered by the multiplication of institutions where a
two-fold absolutism is veiled in entire secresy, they
would be the first to seek a safeguard. The odious
system of direction which during the last few years
has been pervading the Roman Catholic laity, we are
powerless to touch. But the friends of religious
equality should warn any persons if they are carrying
on a secresy which could be remedied, but which if
�22
Vhe Vatican Decrees
continued will ere long lead to an outburst of indigna
tion, a panic, and a persecution. Why should not
gentlemen who have relations in convents and com
munities of men—why should not the superiors of
such institutions propose a plan calculated to meet
real and known inconveniences, and thus, moreover,
to calm the just susceptibilities of the public mind?
There ought to be a register preserved in the guest
room of every religious house, in which the real names
of all inmates should be entered ; inaccuracy of entry
should be punishable by a fine; any person who could
assign a rational reason should, under suitable restric
tions, be enabled to examine such register. All this
might be arranged so as not to cause any inconvenience
to a conventual institution, but, above all, so as not
to affix any stigma of dishonour or apparent suspicion.
Nearly all the unpleasant rumours against convents
would have been suppressed at once had a precaution
so simple and inoffensive been adopted ; and, without
dragging into print allusions to excellent communi
ties of innocent and good people, I may be allowed to
remark that occasionally there have been incidents,
such as imbecile inmates kept in durance and also
sometimes persons secreting themselves in conventual
houses, and so evading the law, which easily give
countenance to those countless suspicions which keep
aggregating till they descend like an avalanche. The
true friends of lasting religious equality must combine,
along with the maintenance of these great principles,
to abolish favouritism, and to adopt in a spirit of fair
ness and consideration, remedies demanded, not by
b'gotry, but by good sesne.
Let me remark, in conclusion, that all my state
ments as to the Papal doctrines imposed on Neo
Catholics are founded, as may be easily verified, on
direct quotations from the Decrees and the Encyclical.
Much more remains behind—unsaid.
�and the “Expostulation”
23
NOTE.
The book formerly deemed the best for the diffusion
of Roman Catholic doctrines was Keenan’s ‘ Controver
sial Catechism.’ It was based on a French Catechism,
and very widely circulated in Great Britain, bearing
the imprimatur of all the Vicars Apostolic of Scot
land. In it appeared the following, until withdrawn
in the year 1869 :—
Q.—Must not Catholics believe the Pope himself
to be infallible ?
A.—This is a Protestant invention : it is no Article
of the Catholic Faith ; no decision of his can oblige,,
under pain of heresy, unless it be received and
enforced by the teaching body—that is by the Bishops,
of the Church.
ADDRESS.
The following is a quotation from an address
delivered by the Rev. James Martineau at Liverpool,
September 25th, 1871, fourteen months after my
secession from the Roman Catholic Church. In
gratefully mentioning that ever-honoured and beloved
name, may I be permitted to record that, trained as I
had been to lean on the authority of others, my know
ledge of the existence of such a spiritual character as
his, developed in the ranks of Christian Theism, pre
sented to my hopes an encouragement and a stimulus
which the gentle diffidence of his genius would
neither have desired or imagined :—
�24
The Vatican Decrees
“ Another event has taken place recently with which
I have had in some degree the privilege of a personal
connection. A very eminent and remarkable man
has given up his adherence to the Catholic religion,
and has thrown himself among us as a preacher of pure
and spiritual religion. I allude to the Rev. Robert
Rodolph Suffield. Now, before Mr. Suffield’s name
was heard amongst us, at his own request I early paid
him a visit at his retreat in the country. I had inti
mate intercourse with him, and learned precisely his
state of thought before he had made up his mind to
the step he has now taken, and I was equally struck
with the problem which was presented to his religious
sense—what is the real essence and nature of
Catholicism ? Now, I found that the view Mr. Suffield
took of Catholicism was this. He said, 4 I see in the
Catholic religion the only example in the world’s
history in which the great and fundamental principles
of all natural piety and of all natural conscience are
made the actuating principles of the life of multitudes
and of nations. The great doctrine of the moral
government of God, the great truth of the absolute
supremacy of conscience, the great hope of a future
and better life—these things have imbued the Catholic
mind, the mind even of the youngest children of the
Catholic Church that have any intelligence at all.
They are realities to the Catholic people. They speak
of them with the same simplicity and openness with
which they would speak of the work of their plough,
of their spade, of their shuttle ; with which they would
speak of the concerns of their houses and their homes.
There is no shyness concerning them. They are ab
solute realities to them, and rule their lives. We
know that they control the passions of young people,
and, if they go astray, by appealing to these images
in their hearts we can recover them again. They are
truly a powei’ in life. And now,’ said Mr. Suffield,
4 what I want to know is, whether outside the Catholic
�and the “Expostulation.”
*5
Church those truths have the same power and reality,
whether they take their places among the facts of life
with the same certainty and with the same efficacy.’
He looked upon the Catholic religion simply as an
instrumentality for bringing home to men the simple
natural convictions of the human heart, and making
them live in their consciences and lives. Catholicism
thus was to him nothing but a great system of natural
religion supported by the most artificial and unnatural
of authorities and supports. That is the view he took
of it, and he said, ‘ What I want to know is, if I dare
to throw away these artificial supports, shall I find it
possible to administer this spiritual theism to man
kind, and get hold of the hearts of men ? Or am I
to believe that it is impossible for the weak mind of
humanity to grapple those truths, unless you have a
false mythology, and all sorts of pictures and images
connected with them ? Does the religion enter by
means of the false imagination, or may we fling away
the false imagination and trust to the spiritual power
of religion ?’ That was the problem he had to solve
for himself, and he said, ‘ I fear if I were to profess
myself a Protestant I should be propping up these
eternal truths with just as false and entangled a ma
chinery as if I were to remain in the Catholic Church.
For, if there is no infallibility in the Catholic Church,
neither is there in the Protestant Scriptures, and
whether I take the one or the other, I throw away
natural truths, and fling myself instead on an artificial
and unnatural support.’ Well, I believe myself that
Mr. Suffield here expressed a great truth ; and I think
the changes which are now taking place in the Pro
testant Churches are all of this kind. The tendency
is to fling away the false dependence upon artificial
authority, and to go back to the primitive rights of
religion in human nature and in human life. I said
to him I should feel it an impiety and infidelity—the
only thing I should venture to call infidelity at all—
�o6
The Vatican Decrees
-to doubt that what God had made true could vindicate
and justify itself to the human heart without any
human lies to back it up and support it. If we once
found that a thing was a lie, and was false, or even if
it was precarious, it was at the peril of all veracity
and of all fidelity that we dared to place that as a
means of underpinning, as it were, and supporting
an eternal and all-important truth.”
RESULTS OF INFALLIBILITY.
Meanwhile there are already signs of a coining conflict in
quarters where they might hardly have been looked for.
There is probably no section of the Church, beyond the walls
of Rome itself, where the dominant spirit is so fiercely and
fervently Ultramontane as among the Roman Catholics of
England. Nor is the phenomenon difficult to account for.
They form a small body in the midst of an unfriendly popu
lation, and the old Catholic families are at once united toge
ther and inspired with zeal by the long tradition of privations
and persecutions patiently endured for their faith. And then,
at the moment when legal disabilities and social ostracism
were beginning to be relaxed, came the irruption of converts
who had sacrificed most of them all the associations, inte
rests, and affections of half a lifetime for their adopted creed,
,and whose leaders, as one of themselves has observed, were
with x>ne illustrious exception, ‘ ‘ Ultramontanes before they
were Catholics.” The late Cardinal Wiseman, whose earlier
policy was of a very different kind, was completely carried
away by the current; his successor has been throughout the
guiding spirit of the infallibilist bishops at the Council, and
all the younger generation of priests have been trained on
the convert model. One of them insisted not long ago,
from the pulpit of a well-known Roman Catholic church
in the metropolis, that it is not to believe the infallibility of
the Pope’s official judgments ; every opinion on whatever
subject he expresses in conversation is infallible. Yet a reso
lute opposition is beginning to manifest itself among both
the clergy and laity of the Roman Catholic Church in Eng
land. We have given several examples of this before now,
and we mentioned the other day that the infallibilist address
presented under strong pressure for the adoption of the Eng
lish clergy had been by no means unanimously signed. Dr.
�and the “Expostulation.”
27
Rymer, President of the diocesan Seminary of St. Edmund’s,
Ware, scandalised the Tablet by writing to express his em
phatic disapproval of it. But the tone and language of the
letter of refusal addressed to its promoters by Father Suf
field, and published apparently by his request in the B estminster Gazette, is so remarkable that it deserves record
here. The writer is the best known and one of the ablest
and most active of the English Dominicans- -a Cambridge
man, though not, we believe, a convert; and it is hardly
likely, considering the stringent discipline of religious com
munities, that he would venture on so bold a protest unless
he felt assured of the moral support of his Order ; and such
an inference is strongly confirmed by the attitude of the
Dominican Cardinal Guidi. Father Suffield says :—
‘ ‘ Knowing with what earnest desire the enemies of our
religion, with taunting speech, at once urge us and defy us to
proclaim, after 1,800 years, the foundation of our Christianity ;
knowing the deep repugnance with which, under the pressure
of ecclesiastical opinion and ecclesiastical prospects, canons,
priests, and bishops, have signed declarations pleasing to
ecclesiastical superiors, and repugnant to their private opinions ;
knowing with an intimate and sad knowledge that the moot
ing of this question has led to investigations, and then to
inquiries, which have paralysed the faith in the minds of
numbers of the clergy and of the intellectual laity, and with
not a few destroyed it, I must respectfully decline to sign a
document in which petitioners ask for a definition, the animus
and consequence of which few can be so thoughtless as not to
perceive.
‘ ‘ If we get a Pope vain, obstinate, and in his dotage, shall
we ask him to be confirmed in his powers of mischief ?
‘ ‘ Do we wish, by exalting the lessons of the encyclical, to
render political life impossible to every honest and consistent
Catholic, and to render the possession of political and religious
equality impracticable to any except those sort of Catholics
who would use the language of liberty when they beg, and
the precepts of the Pope when they refuse ? ”
It is scarcely possible to misapprehend the pointed allusion
to the case of “ a Pope vain, obstinate, and in his dotage,”
and the majority of the Vatican Council has certainly done
what it can to “confirm him in his powers of mischief.”
Father Suffield must be presumed to speak from his own
knowledge when he refers to the numbers of clergy and
educated laity whose faith has been already paralysed or
destroyed by inquiries into Papal infallibility, and his testi
mony is borne out by others ; it is hardly wonderful that he
should look with serious alarm at the further consequences
�28
The Vatican Decrees
that may ensue. The wonder is that those who wish faith
to be maintained and strengthened should be so “ thoughtless ”
as to exult over the “mischief” they have helped to perpe
trate. It is rather late to remind them now of the homely
proverb that the last straw will break the camel’s back, and
this straw is a tolerably weighty one.—Saturday Review, of
July 30th, 1870.
FATHER SUFFIELD AND THE NEW DOGMA.
The newspapers inform us that Father Suffield, late of the
Dominican Order, has joined the Unitarian community ; he
has not only renounced his obedience to the Church of Rome,
but lias apparently renounced also his obedience to the
Catholic Faith. This is very sad, yet not unexpected after
reading his last published letters. The case is one that arrests
our attention, not only on account of the learning and abilities
of Father Suffield, but because it will form, we fear, only a
type of many such cases ; nor is this difficult to understand.
Brought up with the principle, instilled from earliest child
hood, that the Church of Rome is alone the Catholic Church,
excluding the Orthodox and the Anglican ; that the supre
macy of the Pope over the whole Catholic world is the normal
idea of the Church, so completely that those who do not
acknowledge that supremacy are cut off from the promises and
privileges of the Church, even though, like Greeks and
Anglicans, they retain all else necessary to their continuing
portions of the Body of Christ; with these opinions so strongly
impressed on the mind, it is inevitable that there must be a
most violent reaction when the dogma of Infallibility is made
an article of Faith by what claims to be a General Council.
For this dogma is not only a new article of Faith, but it is one
which contradicts much that had been previously held as true ;
it virtually rejects the authority of General Councils as the
voice of the Church, and thus places the Church herself in a
new position. By removing the supreme authority from the
Body, and placing it in one man, who is supposed to be the
head, the original Charter as granted by her Divine Head is
abrogated, and a new one substituted for it. It is no longer,
“Tell it to the Church,” it is “Tell it to the Pope ; ” it is no
longer,” “If he neglect to hear the Church, let him be unto
thee as an heathen man and a publican; ” but, “If he neglect
to hear the Pope”—very naturally the Faith of those who
have been educated, as Father Suffield has been, by Do
minicans, will be violently shaken, and their minds thrown
off their balance, when they are called upon by the authority
�and the “Expostulation.”
29
of the Church to accept the decree of the personal Infallibility
of the Pope. And this reaction is very liable to go to further
lengths than we at first anticipate ; we are apt to expect that
those who, like Father Suffield, repudiate the dogma, and con
sequently find their position as Priests in the Roman Church
untenable, will turn to the Anglican. We should rejoice to
think that the Anglican would form a safe home for those who
reject the dogma, but we fear it will not be so; we are far
more afraid that Father Suffield’s example will be followed
by larger numbers than those who seek refuge with us. We
do not sufficiently consider the habits of thought and mind
which are formed by Roman teaching. In that community
the whole Catholic Faith is wrapped up in, and becomes a part
of, the belief in the Papal Supremacy ; the very rudiments of
the Faith, the Incarnation, the Holy Trinity, the Sacraments,
are all tied up in the idea of the sole supremacy of the Church
of Rome, and the Pope at the head of it ; the idea of the
Catholic Church or any part existing, except under the Roman
obedience, is entirely excluded as impossible. When, there
fore, a rude shock comes like this, which destroys all faith in
the Pope and the Roman Church, it destroys all faith in other
dogmas too.—Church Herald.
The dogma of Infallibility is producing its necessary fruit.
Not even Rome can altogether stop inquiry or fetter thought,
and spiritual absolutism finds its own subjects ready to ques
tion its decrees. Already there is a movement in Germany
which bears striking resemblance to that of the fifteenth cen
tury. A meeting of Roman Catholic professors at Nuremberg
has already agreed upon a protest against the spiritual despot
ism of the Pope, and the Cologne Gazette states that the
Bishop of Rothenberg, Dr. Hefele, has resolved not to accept
the Infallibility Dogma, and that his Chapter and the theo
logical faculty of the city of Tubingen support him in it.
Even in this country, where Roman Catholicism is more
Roman than Rome, the dogma is producing confusion and
distress in the minds of the faithful.
As the immediate result of the Council’s work, the secession
of Father Suffield from the Church of Rome is worthy of more
notice than is due to merely individual change of opinion.
Father Suffield is a man to whom the Roman Catholics of
England are willing to confess large obligations. He is said
to have revived the establishment of Peter’s Pence in this
country, to have done much in recruiting the regiment of
Papal Zouaves, and to have held the first public meeting of
sympathy for the Pope ever held in modern England. A
�3°
The Vatican Decrees
correspondent of the Westminster Gazette says, “it has been
impossible to have been much under Father Suffield’s influence
without becoming intensely devoted to everything Catholic,”
and that “the Prayer-book connected with his name has pro
bably been more instrumental than any other popular manual
in spreading faith wherever English speaking Catholics are to
be found. ” The Prior of the Dominican House in London, of
which order Father Suffield is a prominent member, speaks of
him as “ a brother of the same order, whose personal friend
ship I enjoyed before either of us became Dominicans, and
whose zeal and apostolic spirit I have ever held in the greatest
admiration.”
But Father Suffield seems to have felt somewhat as Father
Newman felt, that though the Infallibility was a dogma to be
received as an act of devotion, it was not to be defended as an
article of the faith. “It becomes essential,” he says, “that
unless failure of reason be impossible to an aged Pope, there
should be some means at least of recognising when his decrees
are to be regarded as the acts of man, when as those of God.”
The shock of disagreement and difference which has been
caused by the proclamation of the Infallibility dogma has,
however, shaken the whole fabric of the eloquent Dominican’s
creed. “An incident, not regretted by me,” he says, “has
revealed, almost by accident, the hidden struggle of years.”
Of this struggle he says, ‘ ‘ it has been the agony of years.”
His doubts have not risen from within, but have been forced
upon him from without. He ‘ ‘ sought solitude first in the
cloister, then solitude greater in a country village amidst
simple people and the children of his flock, that he might
dispel difficulties and doubts. If those difficulties and doubts
have been wrong, none but the highest rulers of the Church
have been responsible for them ; they have not been a pleasure,
but an agony; not a pride, but a humiliation.” Father
Suffield has, therefore, been driven out of the Church by the
declaration of the Papal Infallibility. His case is simply one
of thousands, and is only rendered remarkable by his own
previous services to the Church. The Pope and his Council
have raised more doubts than they will solve, and in grasping
at the shadow of Infallibility they will miss the substance of
authority.—Daily News.
Father Suffield, the eloquent Dominican, whose protest
against the most memorable act of the Vatican Council has
excited some attention in this country, has gone a step beyond
the rejection of the dogma of Papal Infallibility. He has
quitted the Roman Communion. It would seem that as soon
�and the “Expostulation”
3i
as the fact became known overtures were made to him with
the view of his joining the Anglican Church. He has declined
to do so. The Articles and the Athanasian Creed block the
way ; indeed he ‘ ‘ questions alike the Infallibility of the Pope
and of the Scriptures.” He throws in his lot with “those
who are commonly called Unitarians, Free Christians or
Christian Theists,” and states, in effect, that he intends to
accept’ the office of a minister in a Free Christian Congrega
tion.—Manchester Guardian.
A due following out of opinions curiously led Dr. Newman
to the Roman Church, and his brother, Professor Newman,
to pure Theism. In like manner the two Herberts—the one
the free-thinking Lord Herbert of Cherbury, the other the
sainted poet of the English Church : these men felt the philo
sophical impossibility of a middle position. We shall watch
Mr. Suffield’s career with high interest. He will not go in
with the company of Exeter Hall, but sets forth alone in
his quest of truth. There is something very touching, and
very manly too, in his statement of the sufferings of mind and
heart, “which his secession has involved.” Father Suffield
has taken the great leap from authority to freedom.—Dispatch.
FATHER SUFFIELD AND THE CHURCH OF
ENGLAND.
August 22, 1870.
My Dear Sir,—Private communications are so very numer
ous at present, that 1 cannot conveniently add to my occupa
tions by contributing the literary help you do me the favour
of offering. Moreover that able periodical partakes somewhat
of a controversial character, and is regarded as anti-Catholic
in its position. I am peculiarly circumstanced, have resigned
all offices in the Catholic Church, and ceased the exercise of
priestly and Catholic rites : from the intimate manner in
which I have been interwoven in the Catholic body in England,
this act causes great pain to those whom the least I should
like to wound ; and I am anxious to do nothing but what is
demanded by the exigencies of circumstances or the require
ments of conscience, which could in the slightest degree
grieve those who have so many claims upon my affection
gratitude, and reverence.
’
After long and deep thought, study, prayer, and counsel, I
decided that it would be impossible for me honestly to
continue to act as a priest. The infallibility of the Pope, and,
�32
The Vatican Decrees
of the Scriptures, alike, I question, and the dogmas resting
solely on either of those authorities, I am not able on that
account to admit.
It is my desire to unite with others, and to assist them in
the worship of God, and in the practice of the two-fold
precepts of charity, unfettered by adhesion on either side, to
anything, beyond those great fundamental principles’ as
presented to us by Jesus Christ.
Though relieved from all the obligations of my order, I do
not wish to consider myself as alienated from the Catholic
Church or from other Christian communities, by any personal
hostile act. I assume a position hostile to none—if one man
hurls an anathema, another man is not compelled either to
accept it, or to retaliate it.
H aving understood that those who are commonly called Uni
tarians, Free Christians, or Christian Theists, thus agree in
the liberty inspired by self-diffidence, humility, and charity,
to carry on the worship of God, without sectarian requirements
or sectarian opposition ; that they possess a simple but not
vulgar worship, a high standard of virtue, intelligence, and
integrity ; and these after the Christian type, moulded by the
Christian traditions, and edified by the sacred Scriptures ;
holding the spirit taught by Jesus Christ, and the great
thoughts by virtue of which he built up the ruins of the moral
world; and yet not enforcing the reception of complicated
dogmas as a necessity, or accounting their rejection a crime :
a communion of Christian worshippers, bound loosely together,
and yet by the force of great principles enabled quietly to
maintain their position, to exercise an influence elevating and
not unimportant, and to present religion under an aspect which
thoughtful men can accept without latent scepticism, and
earnest men without the aberrations of superstition, or the
abjectness of mental servitude to another—such approved
itself to my judgment, and commended itself to my sympathy.
I intend adhering to the pursuits of the clergyman and of the
Christian teacher, and communications are in progress in
another part of England which may terminate in my accepting
thus a duty conformable to the habits of my life, and which
will not throw me into a position of hostility, or embarrassment
as to those honoured and loved Catholic friends with whom
so greatly I should prize, if it were possible to maintain kindly
intercourse, inasmuch as I am only externally severed from
them by my being unable to believe certain dogmas which a
Catholic is bound to regard as essential. Thus I hope I have
not only thanked you for your obliging offer, but adequately
explained my position, and showed that the future you were
commissioned to hold out to me in the Established Church
�and the “Expostulation
33
would not be deemed possible by the authorities who have
done me the honour and kindness to communicate in my
regard, as soon as they are made aware that the Articles and
the Athanasian creed would be amongst the insuperable
barriers to my entertaining such a proposal.
Many write to me evidently under a grievous misapprehen
sion. They anticipate from me reckless denunciations of that
vision of beauty which I have left, simply because, like a
vision, it had everything but reality. Allied as I am by
relationship with some of our ancient Catholic families, allied
by the ties of friendship with many more of them, I feel it is
a shame to myself that any stranger could suppose one word
of my lips, one thought of my mind, could cast moral reproach
on those beautiful and honoured homes where old traditions
received a lustre greater even than antiquity and suffering can
bestow—crowned with the aureola of charity, nobleness,
purity, and devotedness. Such memories print on my heart
their everlasting record. To cease to believe and to worship
with them was a martyrdom, which none but the Catholic can
understand.
I have ascended now to another stage of my life ; to rise to
it needed sufferings of the mind and of the heart, the sacrifice
of everything in the world I cared for;—but I perceive a work
to do, and, by the blessing of God, I shall strive to perform
it. Youth, strength, vigour, and hope return to me with the
expectation. Truth obtained by suffering is doubly dear to
the possessor. —Very sincerely yours,
Robert Rodolph Suffield.
To the Rev. ----- &c., &c.
N.B.—All the above paragraphs, from different periodicals,
are extracted from Church Opinion.
�ALSO,
By
the
Rev.
R. R. SUFFIELD,
FIVE LETTERS ON CONVERSION TO ROMAN
CATHOLICISM
-................................................ 3d.
IS JESUS GOD ?........................................................ 3d.
TRUBNER
and
CO., LUDGATE HILL, LONDON, E.C.
PRINTED BY C. W. REYNELL, LITTLE PtTLTENEY STREET, HAYMARKET,
�
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A collection of digitised nineteenth-century pamphlets from Conway Hall Library & Archives. This includes the Conway Tracts, Moncure Conway's personal pamphlet library; the Morris Tracts, donated to the library by Miss Morris in 1904; the National Secular Society's pamphlet library and others. The Conway Tracts were bound with additional ephemera, such as lecture programmes and handwritten notes.<br /><br />Please note that these digitised pamphlets have been edited to maximise the accuracy of the OCR, ensuring they are text searchable. If you would like to view un-edited, full-colour versions of any of our pamphlets, please email librarian@conwayhall.org.uk.<br /><br /><span><img src="http://www.heritagefund.org.uk/sites/default/files/media/attachments/TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" width="238" height="91" alt="TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" /></span>
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The Vatican decrees and the "Expostulation"
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Suffield, Robert Rodolph
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Place of publication: London
Collation: 33 p. ; 19 cm.
Notes: Inscription in pencil on title page : With the author's kind regards. From the library of Dr Moncure Conway. Printed by C.W. Reynell. Includes extracts from comments and letters published in Church Opinion and a quotation from an address delivered by Rev. James Martineau at Liverpool, September 25th, 1871. Two other works by Suffield published by Trubner on last page.
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Catholic Church
Catholic Church-Doctrines
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Z'K/V
•
VATICAN DECREES
AND
THE “EXPOSTULATION.”
BY
ROBERT RODOLPH SUFFIELD,
Minister of the Free Christian Church, Wellesley Road, Croydon; formerly
Apostolic Missionary and Prefect of the “Guard of Honour;"
Author of several Pamphlets in this Series.
PUBLISHED
BY
TEUBNER AND
CO.,
57 AND 59 LUDGATE HILL ; AND
THOMAS SCOTT,
11 THE TERRACE, FARQUHAR ROAD, UPPER NORWOOD, LONDON, S.E.
1874.
Price Sixpence.
•’V
�■t
f
LONDON:
PRINTED
BY C. W. REYNELL, 16 LITTLE PULTENEY STREB'
HAYMARKET, W.
�PREFACE.
Since the appearance of Mr. Gladstone’s “ Expos
tulation,” I have been repeatedly asked to express my
opinions as to the political bearing of the Vatican
decrees. The subject is of an extent and complication
beyond the limits of a pamphlet; but as some friends
are partial enough to urge me to make known, at
least in a general way, something of the result of my
thoughts and experience, I can no longer consistently
maintain the silence which I should prefer. Though
after the thoughtful and accurate statements which
have emanated from Mr. Gladstone, Lord Acton,
Lord Camoys, the Right Rev. Monsignore Capel, the
Very Rev. Monsignore Patterson, and the able com
ments upon the same in our leading periodicals, I
have little to add beyond the expression of my per
sonal experience ; the quotations, which at the request
of the same parties are appended to this brochure,
will explain to strangers my profound personal inte
rest in a question which has so intimately affected
my own life.
��THE VATICAN DEGREES
AND
THE “EXPOSTULATION.”
EOPLE cannot be allowed the pleasure of at the
same time affirming and denying a conviction.
The Neo-Catholics, headed by the Pope, and in
England by Archbishop Manning, declare the Vatican
decrees to be an undoubted expression of the Divine
will. The Old Catholics, represented by such men
as Bishop Reinkins, Dr. Dollinger, and Lord Acton,
declare them to be merely the utterances of what
Dr. Newman designated “ an aggressive and insolent
faction.” The Vatican Council is either ecumenic or
schismatic. Skilful men can find reasons on either
side, and consistent men may act out either conclu
sion. The Old Catholics deny the infallibility of
the Vatican Council. The Neo-Catholics affirm its
infallibility. Learning has ranged itself on the side
of the “ Old ” Catholics; diplomacy on the side of the
“ New.” The Roman Catholic Church has disappeared;
the Vatican Church has supplanted it. We have
too much appreciation of the learning of the “ Old ”
Catholics, and the diplomatic ambition of the ecclesi
astical rulers of the “ New,” to be able to regard as a
nonentity that momentous revolution. When men
the wealth of whose virtues and learning had enriched
the Papal cause could, in advanced years, sorrow
fully permit the Pope and some millions of adherents
to leave them, at once warning and anathematized—
P
�4
^he Vatican Decrees
warning those who leave, anathematized by those
who have left;—when acute diplomatists like Dr. Man
ning urge on a revolution with all the ardour
inspired by ambition, and in presence of the sorrow
ful laments and pathetic warnings of men who had
grown old in the service of a cause then about to
die,—surely a nonentity was just the last event
contemplated by anyone. The Old Catholics and
New Catholics alike beheld in that revolution the
inauguration of a new era of individual absolutism,
to be established as the embodiment of the Divine
will; and in the name of religion, of liberty, of
humanity, the Old Catholics raised their protest. In
the name of Pius IX. and of possession, the New
Catholics raised the war cry, which died off into
a perpetual anathema. Those men who contended
on the battle-field of thought, of history, of diplo
macy, until the fatal victory of July, 1870, were not
children contending for baubles : they were men who
entered the lists. Some contended for truth, others
fought for power. The triumphant faction being in
possession of the Vatican, in possession of the
Episcopal Sees, in the possession of the ecclesiastical
edifices, retained easily power over the masses. What
they sought, they have obtained. Whenever their
chief ruler issues any declaration which he means to
be infallible, it is infallible. Should any voice,
retaining a ring of the accents of liberty, dare to say,
“The subject on which you have decreed is out of
- the range of faith and morals, so you only therein
.decree as a man;” the Ruler replies, “You have
; accepted as Divine the Vatican decrees; you therein
-declared that you will be accursed, and forfeit your
eternal salvation, unless you inwardly believe and
heartily accept, and outwardly in practice conform to
that belief, that the jurisdiction of the Roman Pontiff
is over all the Faithful individually and collectively;
that his authority compels your entire and unreserved
�and the “Expostulation.”
5
obedience, not only in matters appertaining to faith
and morals, but also in all those that.appertain to the
discipline and government of the Church. You
have declared your internal assent to the Divine
decree, whereby you learn that this power is from
God, represents God, is full and supreme, and not
merely of inspection and direction; that it is superior
to all other power, extends everywhere, must never
be controlled, must always enjoy free and immediate
communication with its subjects wherever they may
be; that its judgments may never be reviewed, appealed
against, or disregarded; that to it alone it apper
tains to declare what belongs to its jurisdiction and
what domains of thought and of action (if any) are
exempt from its infallible utterances.”
Obviously the Vatican faction could not regard as
meaningless and powerless such expressions, cau
tiously worded and decreed after mature deliberation.
Their promulgation was enjoined. The Vatican party
must not be surprised if those who protested against
their formation desire their promulgation. What can
be done, what was meant to be done, what will be
done, we want all men to know I Vatican diplomacy,
having obtained the weapons, would rather that the
Faithful alone, and they but gradually, should realise
the weight of the sceptre which they have forged and
feebly yielded to an Italian priest. But we would
rather know and feel the metal of the weapon pre
pared for us. A sword sheathed in velvet is still a
sword. Chains concealed in the intentions of a pre
late, still are chains. They are meant for us, and we
should like to handle them. We have been recently
somewhat naively told that they will be “ convenient.”
Doubtless ; therefore the more that is known about
them the better. In a docile school the boys collect
the birch rods, and with wondering fear feel their
substance, and speculate on their effects. If the scholars
become too frightened, should panic threaten an in
�6
Hhe Vatican Decrees
convenient outbreak, the master and ushers will pru
dently explain that the rods will be hardly ever used;
that they are merely symbols of authority, quite
harmless, almost pleasant; that obviously it can make
no difference whether the rods are in the school-room
or on the trees ; they were only gathered at the urgent
request of the boys. All very good ; but still a boy
might like to know that they are there, are meant to
be used, and will be used.
In former times we English people knew what the
Popes could effect amongst those who revered in him
a Divine primacy, but not a Divine individual, irre
sponsible infallibility. What is prepared for ns now,
when the Papal authority is declared to be absolute,
immediate, personal—when his utterances must be
believed as well as obeyed ? Now that a circle of hell
fire is drawn around the Papal subject, he must either,
like the Salamander, kill his mental liberty, or live for
ever in the flames. People have said, Why in this
country, at a time of profound peace, when all the
Vatican Catholics are living in undoubted loyalty—
why call attention to the Vatican decrees when they
are consoling Roman prelates and harming no one ?
We reply, It is just the time when we should examine
the weapons forged for emergencies. If the English
people were in times of excitement to realise the mag
nitude of the triumphant revolution, we cannot tell to
what excesses some amongst them might be driven.
Those principles of religious equality which we have
been slowly conquering by the patient energy of men
whose passion is for justice might have been pushed
back for generations into the dregs of a cowardly and
insane persecution. All men, of whatever creed,
Roman or the opposite, ought to rejoice that this sub
ject should have been brought to the front and can
vassed at a moment when it appeals to no triumphant
bigotries. I am convinced that nothing can better
secure our Roman countrymen in England than what
�and the “Expostulation.”
7
is now taking place. Let all men realise what must
and ought to be the line of action of a consistent sup
porter of the Vatican Church, as contrasted with the
position of the Old Catholics; let all men, having rea
lised it, know what to expect; let all then renew within
their minds the intense conviction that under no cir
cumstances whatsoever must opinions be punished;
that the State has only to deal with actions, and
amongst actions only with those which obviously
affect the commonwealth ; then we shall be strong to
resist and to suppress that hurricane of anti-Roman
indignation which will soener or later arise, and which
might carry away many of our great principles of
liberty, if we were not prepared to meet it by a recog
nition of the causes exciting it.
No controversialist could have caught the public
ear and instructed the public mind. The foremost
man in England alone could do it; the statesman,
rich in scholarship and in thought, representing in
his own person whatever is the highest in culture,
the most illustrious in our national traditions, the
most reverent, religious, and tolerant in character;
he, the near relative of one Roman Catholic, the inti
mate friend of many, was, above all others, the man
to speak. Judging by the standard of expediency,
his words may politically injure him; judging by the
standard of rectitude, his Expostulation ” will be
recorded amongst the most honourable deeds of an
honourable career. Many will have cause to rejoice
at it; but, above all, must we, the disciples of Reli
gious Equality, rejoice that the people of England
should have been instructed in the words and bearing
of the Vatican Decrees when that instruction could
be received quietly, take its place in the public mind
harmlessly and prepare us against contingencies
wisely.
As to explanations, there are none to give.
Some Roman Catholics, like Sir George Bowyer,
�8
The Vatican Decrees
may not as yet understand the Decrees, and may,
in consequence of their known spirit of submission,
be allowed to write condemned propositions publicly,
trusting to their private repentance in the Con
fessional. But the common sense of the people of
England will easily perceive that the question is not
whether now the Pope may be enforcing loyalty or
not, but what all consistent subjects of the Vatican
Church must do when the Pope may enforce another
course. Regarding that, there can be no question.
Catholics will divide between those who accept the
Vatican Decrees and those* who reject them; the
latter will practically be in the same position as all
the Episcopal Churches, independent of Rome, e.g.,
the Greek, Russian, English, American, and German.
In saying that, we can easily surmise the future
action of Neo-Catholics as to Papal Decrees hostile
to our national interests. I do not mean to state that
their constant obedience to the Pope can be always
depended upon by him. Men do not always act in
accordance with their convictions, even under pain of
certain eternal damnation. But we must not forget
that no Neo-Catholic can approach the Sacraments if
he be engaged in any line of action forbidden by the
Pope; and all Catholics deem the Sacraments essen
tial to salvation ; moreover, disobedience to the Pope
in a grave matter would be understood to be invariably
a mortal sin. A soldier dying in a forbidden service
knows that he perishes for ever in Hell. It may be
said, practically, the Pope will probably not frequently
interfere—that will depend—one fact let us remem
ber, the Pope does not show much interest in matters
of merely personal or public virtue—he seldom thinks
it worth his while to issue a Decree against drunk
enness and such like faults. When dignified eccle
siastics in this country have taken up such merely
moral questions, it has been well known that it has
been chiefly to prevent the cause falling into the
�and the “Expostulation”
9
exclusive hands of Protestants. But the questions
connected with Papal power have never been allowed
to sleep. During the last years, Boman Catholics have
felt as if all religion and morality depended upon the
success of Papal political schemes. All the action of
the Pope has been to concentrate power in himself,
and to make it daily felt. His chief representatives
in England and Ireland have been appointed by the
Pope, in defiance of the wishes of the Faithful and
their clergy, and without the concurrence of one single
national vote. Regulations of a most arbitrary cha
racter as to marriage and education have been insti
tuted and enforced, in opposition to the wishes, in
terests and customs of the Faithful concerned.
It rends one’s memories to think of the noblehearted Roman Catholics of England, representatives
of ancient traditions of religion and of loyalty, their
lives as blameless and as beautiful as the poetic
legends of their Faith—they truthfully, through their
vicars apostolic, disowned all those Papal claims
which though often advanced and often recognised,
were not those “ Of Faith ”—on the strength of their
honest disclaimer they were restored to rights which
they ought never to have lost, and all the Liberals of
England rejoiced on that day when, in the Palace of
Westminster, the Roman Catholic nobles re-entered
the ancient hall, on each side of which the peers arose
to greet, them, the bearers of historic names, the re
presentatives of great traditions,—a principle greater
than all traditions arose and bade them welcome—it
was the principle of Religious Equality 1 What have
those men done, to use the eloquent plaint of Dr.
Newman, that the hearts of the just should be made
sad ? Rome, ever reckless of honour when power can
be grasped 1 what was it to Rome, that these sons of
crusaders and of martyrs had, on the strength of her
silence, plighted a word higher than the word of any
creed—the word of an English gentleman—and by
�IO
The Vatican Decrees
that word disowned and denied all the usurped pre
tensions of Rome. When the convenient time
arrived, a power that has never kept its word, com
pelled English gentlemen to violate theirs, to recant
all that they had said—it was the very triumph of the
Priest over the Man I—like the tyrant general who
seduced the honour of a virgin, and then presented to
her dishonoured gaze the corpse of the father she had
fondly hoped to have saved. The Roman Catholic
gentlemen yielded their honour to save their Church
—the Pope has presented to them as a corpse the
Church for which they interceded.
It is idle to point to the deeds of English Roman
Catholics in the days of old. In July, 1870, Italian
Priests and their coadjutors slew the old Church, and
intoned over it the Requiem. You find that Requiem
in the Vatican Decrees. Formerly, in periods of
discord, many Roman Catholics always sided with
the Pope, because they revered the primacy of his
dignity, the sacredness of his origin, and recognised
him as the centre of the Church’s unity ; other Roman
Catholics disobeyed him, resisted him, besieged his
capital, and yet, approaching the Sacraments, lived
and died in union with the Roman Church and its
creed, but resisting as exaggerated, or criminal, or
unpatriotic, actions and commands of the Roman
Pontiff. All that is past. The Pope was not
satisfied with the willing service of the free—some
to obey, others to oppose—and yet all to be one
with him in Faith and Sacraments. Those mystic
rites, tokens of spiritual memories, must wait
upon diplomacy, and be subject to his temporal
ambitions. Have all, or none. No wonder that in
many an English Roman Catholic home—many an
old home of chivalry, faith,.and honour—a sorrowful
choice presented itself; accustomed to regard visible
unity with the Pope as essential to salvation, some
accepted the Papal Sacraments and slavery, others
�v^ppaF*' • .. A't^V^.’T*.
- • <f ’ '*..- ' »/??,
and the “Expostulation.”
•’.*\;'/"r 7£ W
11
sought Free Sacraments and personality, and in so
seeking they deemed the “ Free ” more Christian, more
Catholic than the “ Papal.” The men on each side
we honour, but let us not amidst our sentiments of
homage to conscientiousness—nay, may I add, to
memory and to affection—let us not forget that the
Catholics, divided now into the Vatican and the Old,
represent different principles, opposing positions.
The Vatican faction has triumphed, and has suc
ceeded in establishing all the principles the most
fatal to the development of the human mind, of
human society, of religion, -of morals, of science, of
rational liberty. There is no explaining away what
has been done—either embrace it or disown it. Mr.
Gladstone’s “ Expostulation ” may display to view a
few of those on either side. But the side taken is
really to be easily discovered by a more obvious test.
Who receives Sacraments from a Neo-Catholic priest ?
Who refuses so to do ? The statements in Mr. Glad
stone’s “ Expostulation ” are so cautiously accurate,
that I need only refer to them; but we must remem
ber that the Vatican Decree is retrospective. The
“ Encyclical ” has become a compendium of articles
of faith; and every cause dear to a patriot and a
man of justice is cursed by its inhuman decrees.
You mock us with Italian irony, when in the presence
of the civilised world you first solemnly anathematise
science, civilisation, progress, and equal rights, when
you refuse your Sacraments and paternal fellowship
to those who cannot mentally believe the truth or
justice of your anathemas. When you declare that
those who cannot worship with you have no right to
worship anywhere; have, in fact, no rights outside the
walls of a prison or the steps of a scaffold, to which
you declare that your Church has divine power to
commit them; and then, when we read your decrees
and your admonition to civil governors to aid their
execution, and we read your own solemn utterances
�12
The Vatican Decrees
and tremble for the liberties which may be subjected
to your keeping—the liberty of the individual, the
liberty of the family, the liberty of the State, the
liberty of education, of science, of conscience—and
deliberate how we can preserve our liberty and
honour without violating yours, you assume the air of
injured innocence and wonder that we should call
attention to what really meant nothing at all, but
that, as we seem annoyed, you will put your heads
together, give us a nice explanation—a pill so care
fully sugared that even a Cardinal could swallow it.
But we say, we have had your explanations, you
thought about them well enough, you have promul
gated them to the world, we will learn your mind
from the words which you say are inspired—the
words of your Encyclicals and Vatican Decrees—not
from words which you can repudiate as soon as they
have succeeded in blinding. The indignant mind of
Europe has caught you “in flagrante delicto,” and
you turn round with a surprised smile and tell us you
meant no harm; you have taken bigotry, and into
lerance, and arrogance into your counsels, and com
bined together in a conspiracy against humanity—we
detect you, and you say, “ be quiet—what have we
done ? ” You send over your prelates to this England
of ours, and they talk glibly about liberty of worship,
and liberty of conscience, and liberty of speech, and
liberty of the press, and liberty of education, and
liberty of investigation, when they know—and now we
know—that they mean liberty for their own worship,
conscience, speech, education and press, but ana
themas against any one who dares even to think that
such liberty ought to belong to others. You forget
that our passionate devotion to the liberties you
anathematise are alone the cause why the Liberals of
England, headed by their great Statesman, declare
—“ Your equal liberties shall remain inviolate, by
virtue of the very principles you declare to be
�and the “Expostulation?
13
accursed.” Having said that, and meaning to act
upon it, and determined not to be driven from it by
any foreign or domestic influence, we have surely
proclaimed all that the very chivalry of principle can
demand. But you can expect no more.
If a body of Puritans had existed in Rome in the
days of the Papal sovereignty; if they had in solemn
conclave declared that they regarded the Pope as
anti-Christ, and all his followers accursed by God and
to be repudiated by man, that no Roman Catholic
ought to be allowed any religious educational liberty—
that the Puritan conclave had a Divine right to extir
pate all such liberties—that it was the duty of the
civil power to enforce whatever action the aforesaid
conclave deemed prudent to enact, with the view of
forcibly destroying the existence of the Roman
Catholic religion—that Roman Catholics possess no
rights, but may be tolerated when toleration becomes
a regretable necessity. Suppose these Puritans to
have received civil rights because the Pope imagined
their principles of hostility to have merged into merely
religious and theoretical difference, the Puritans de
claring such to be the case, and repudiating the state
ments attributed to them which had been subversive
of civil loyalty; supposing that a few years afterwards
these Roman Puritans met together, and declare that
all the opinions ever taught by their wildest divines
were part of the Gospel message; that they now
solemnly proclaim them as absolutely true, and held
firmly by all who join them ; that they have placed
themselves, for the protection of their principles,
under the control of the Emperor of Germany; that
at present they are perfectly satisfied with their posi
tion, and perfectly loyal. What would have been the
attitude of the Pope ? Prisons and scaffolds would
reply. But suppose the Pope to have been a secret
heretic, and, therefore, at liberty to follow the nobler
inspirations of conscience—suppose him to have an
unbounded confidence in the strength of his position
�14
’The Vatican Decrees
and the final, though often remote, triumph of the
Right; but suppose him also to be a man capable of
appreciating what is demanded by self-respect and by
regard to the feelings of the loyal. What then would
have been his policy ? Would he have invited to his
more secret counsels Puritans known to maintain
the entire and universal supremacy of the German
Emperor ? Would he have recognised the Puritan
emissaries appointed by the Emperor for the super
vision of his Roman subjects, especially if the Em
peror had publicly claimed him as his own subject ?
Would he invariably have taken the dictation of the
German emissary as to the chaplains for the Roman
army and Roman prisons P Would the citizens of
Rome have felt anxious to show special social con
sideration to the German emissary, whose chief func
tion it would be to keep the Puritans thoroughly
loyal to the Emperor, and ready to obey him when
ever occasion might demand ? If the Pope had so
acted in moments of weakness and romance, he would
have retraced his steps as soon as he recovered his selfrespect ; if a secret heretic, and so able to act nobly,
he would not begin to persecute the Puritans; he
would permit the Emperor to appoint his own emis
saries over the Puritan schools, Puritan institutions,
Puritan chapels, Puritan conclaves ; but he would not
permit the Emperor to appoint his own nominees to
public institutions, and then undertake to pay them ;
such refusal would not necessarily be the result of
fear, but of consistency and self-respect, and from a
conscientious desire not to encourage by favouritism the
further encroachments and pretensions of the German
Emperor. He would feel it due to his own subjects,
not to go out of his way to place in office of power
and of public trust those who continued obviously to
treat him as inferior to the Emperor. But if he
perceived other Puritans who maintained their inde
pendence of the decrees of the conclave, and though
�and the “Expostulation.”
15
sympathising with the Emperor on account of simi
larity of creed, yet obviously regretting his claims to
supremacy in all causes over the Emperor, the Pope
would treat such Puritans like any other of his
subjects, without adverting in public action to their
difference of creed.
Such, I presume, ought to be our line of action ,
as to the foreign potentate who has recently claimed.
Supremacy over all the baptised amongst our country
men. We ought to ignore utterly and entirely all the
Papal claims, and Papal emissaries, as such. A Papal
Archbishop should be to us simply an English citizen,
or, if a foreigner, a foreign visitor, and nothing more;
we ought not, on the ground of his being a Papal
prelate, to confer with him, and to arrange appoint
ments, or accept his appointments, and ask the wishes
of his foreign sovereign. To do so is contrary to
self-respect—to the national honour. If we had been
as anxious to consult the feelings and wishes of the
Irish people, and of the labouring classes of England,
as we have been anxious to defer to the wishes of an
Italian prelate, we should have but little discontent
in either country. Statesmen of large sympathies
have thought that they would be above all things
pleasing the English Roman Catholics and the Irish
people by finding out what would please the Pope,
and doing it. Oh, marvellous simplicity! Do not
the Irish remember full well that a Pope gave Ireland
to an English conqueror. That a Pope sent over a
Cardinal to help the English Government to suppress
national aspifations which were regarded with
apprehension at Rome ? Cardinal Cullen does not
enjoy the confidence of the Irish people; the prelate
they adore is the one who voted against the Papal
infallibility, an Archbishop whom the Pope would
depose if he dared. When he dies, he will probably
be succeeded by some docile canonist forawhom no
Irishman has voted. Dr. Cullen was appointed’by
�i6
The Vatican Decrees
Rome without the concurrence of the Irish clergy.
His objects are of a very matron-like character, and
not at all representative of the wishes of the Irish
people. If we want to legislate with a view to the
wishes and feelings and real living interests of the
Irish people, we must not ask the guidance of any
Roman Cardinal. The Irish ask for national equality,
and we offer them a “ concession ” about the normal
schools, or invite a Papal prelate to meet a Princess,
and give him precedence over whatever might have
represented the national aspirations. The Irish
people ask for liberty, and you give them chaplains.
The Irish ask for extension of the franchise, repeal
of penal enactments, a national militia, and a local
Parliament, and you say we cannot do those things
for you, but we will pay your chaplains, and confer
with your venerated Bishops as to any other conces
sion they may deem desirable. I do not venture on
this occasion an opinion whether or not the real
wishes of the Irish people can be accepted or not; I
merely, for my present purpose say, if you want to '
conciliate the Irish people you will not do so by fawn
ing upon the Pope and the clergy: they have their
objects; the Irish people have other objects. When
shall we give to nations the equal rights which we
more than give to the emissaries of a foreign power ?
Surely the loyalty of a nation is of more consequence
than the purchased conventional loyalty of a priest
hood.
But it may be said, anyhow in England, the way to
conciliate the gentry is to make much of the Papal
prelates. First of all I would say the English Roman
Catholic gentlemen needed no conciliation ; they were
loyal to the backbone; they had everything to lose
and nothing to gain by any change—any possible
change. When the Vatican Decrees were issued, about
two dozen men, distinguished by intellect, character,
and culture, refused submission, and thus virtually
�and the “Expostulation.”
*7
assumed the position of “ Old Catholics,” like, for
instance, Lord Acton, the best-read Catholic in Eng
land. But most of the Catholics adopted the new
dogma. Thus the Roman Catholics recognised by
Catholic emancipation are now represented by only
a few honoured names, but very small in number,
probably such as Lord Camoys, Lord Acton, Petre,
Trevelyan, Simeon, Riddell, Oxenham, Thynne,
Wetherall, Hernans, Blenherhasset, Maskell, Charlton,
and some others. The Catholics who have embraced
the new Catholicism are numerous and submissive;
they deserve our high personal admiration, for their
change, along with all their prelates, was most natural
to expect, and undoubtedly as conscientious on their
part as the action of the more learned of the laity who
remained “ Old Catholics.” But it must not be sup
posed that the New Catholics are, generally speaking,
grateful to Dr. Manning and the Papal faction for
the revolution brought, numerically, to so successful
an issue by their ecclesiastical tactics. English
Catholics have undoubtedly been more interested in
ecclesiastical matters than in political or national,
and thus they have been easily led over into the Papal
camp which their fathers renounced at the emancipa
tion ; but they inherit, along with all the old English
virtues, the old English contempt for Italian domina
tion. Our Government would have pleased English
Catholics better if there had been less courting of
ecclesiastics appointed by Rome, less seeking to carry
out mere ecclesiastical polity. Any one intimate with
the English Roman Catholic tone of thought must
be full well aware how bitterly English gentlemen
have bent beneath the yoke. It is worthy of note
that Dr. Manning was nominated Archbishop by the
Pope against the wish of the whole of the Diocesan
Chapter. Not one vote was given for him. The
English Roman Catholic families, grieved at his
appointment, knew what it meant, feared the results,
�i8
'Dhe Vatican Decrees
dreaded the priestly yoke and the papal absolutism ;
but, taught to submit, they did submit. It does not
follow that we need submit likewise. Truthfulness,
dignity, consistency, demand from us that we ignore
a Neo-Catholicism which we have never nationally
recognised. I am aware that for a time we may be
hampered by the grave political difficulty of being
bound to show special favour to the Episcopal Church
of England, and that the Neo-Catholics may
justly say, as you devote large sums of money to
promote worship and education, according to the
principles of Protestant or Ritualistic Anglicanism,
as the case may be, why should you not continue to pay
the Vicars Apostolic appointed by the Pope in some
of our colonies ? Why not continue the payment of
Neo-Catholic chaplains throughout India, in the Army,
and elsewhere ?—why not'perpetuatefor the promulga
tion of Neo-Catholicism the favour and the funds you
devoted for the Roman Catholicism which your Par
liament recognised ? Doubtless it is always difficult
to rise out of a false position; but unless these anoma
lies are rectified, dangers await us far more serious
than the transient unpopularity obtained by touching
existing abuses.
Protestants have not yet realised the momentous
character of the Revolution crowned at the Vatican.
No wonder; how could it be expected when intelli
gent Roman Catholics of lofty character and integrity,
like Lord Herries and Sir George Bowyer, do not
understand it ? I understand it, because as a Dominican
and theologian I studied the whole question during
the period of restless thought preceding the close of
the conflict in July, 1870. It was that study which
opened my eyes to the fallacy of the entire dogma of
infallibility. Heretofore, Roman Catholics were
only bound to bejieve in the infallibility of the
Church in union with the Pope and speaking through
the Pope. It was quite another question as to what
�and the 11Expostulation.”
19
was needed to constitute an ex cathedra decree.
Some affirmed that no decree was infallible unless
issued in presence of a general council and with its
concurrence; others affirmed that a decree was
proved to be ex cathedra when accepted by the
council dispersed; others affirmed that a decree was
ex cathedra if issued with great solemnity after
conferring with, and in union with, all the consul
tive congregations of the Roman Church. A Roman
Catholic vacillated amongst these views according to
the exigencies of history, conscience, common sense,
or controversy. The most opposing opinions could
be and were maintained by Bishops, scholars, and
laymen. But now the Vatican Decrees have declared
the Pope to be infallible whenever he intends to be
so, and on whatever subject he declares to fall within
the province of infallibility. Heretofore, the exercise
of the Papal power was limited in action as well as in
theory. National Churches and their Episcopate
disputed his decisions and refused to obey his
mandates. Those mandates could be only imposed
under peculiar circumstances, but the present Pope
has, during his long Pontificate, been concentrating
power in himself. He commenced by utilising the
prestige of his acknowledged position, and the
affection inspired by the kindness of his disposition :
but having attained an unprecedented power over all
National Churches through such means, he culminated
the strategy by first committing Bishops and the
Faithful everywhere to bombastic declarations as to
his divine and supreme prerogatives, and then taking
them at their word, and requiring the exaggerated
utterances of affectionate reverence to be formularised
into articles of faith. They were caught in the trap
they themselves had guilelessly fashioned. The Pope’s
well-known smile, half artful, half cheery, must have
welcomed the accomplishment of his long cherished
scheme. During the period of twenty years I was
�20
The Vatican Decrees
Apostolic Missioner throughout England and Ireland
I saw this power growing; we all dreaded it, for
we saw what an agency would be lodged in the
hands of a Pope abler than Pio Nono and less good,
yet what could we do ? The growing power was
not generally being used for criminal objects, it
was being exercised in England through eccle
siastics for the most part amiable and good. Thus
there was nothing suddenly done of a nature to
arouse and combine opposition; like the walls of the
Temple, the chains were forged amidst a silence only
disturbed by the reception of countless adulatory
addresses, and blessings, and indulgences prodigally
bestowed upon herds of people who listened to the
Holy Father as he repeated again and again the
story of his wrongs, his sufferings, his prerogatives,
and his similarity to Jesus Christ, after a fashion
which would have aroused the ludicrous in any minds
not sunk too low to be capable of appreciating the
ridiculous. But the result is far from being ludicrous.
The Pope has established over the millions of adhe
rents of the Vatican Church a two-fold tyranny—
over every man, woman, and child, within his Church—
the absolutism of a teaching which may never be
even interiorly doubted; the absolutism of a rule
which may never be with impunity disobeyed. This
two-edged weapon hangs like the sword of Damocles
over every one who dares to think, to write, to act, to
rule, or to serve. At present, the Pope has only one
great object of anxiety—the recovery of his former
provinces—but hereafter other objects may arise.
But more than the political and national consequences
I do acutely mourn over the crushing mental and
moral effect of such an absolutism over all conscience,
all lifp, all energy, all thought. My intimate acquaint
ance with the personal excellence of English and
Irish Boman Catholics, lay, cleric, and conventual,
makes me deplore the more bitterly a despotism,
�ana the “Expostulation.
which must gradually destroy all the higher develop
ments of character, and turn the descendants of the
fine old English Catholic families into abject Jesuit
ical serfs. In the name of God, may such never be.
Anyhow, may the people of England not expedite
that fall by the imprudence and injustice of a per
secution which would speedily unite those who may
otherwise partially dissolve; or, on the other hand,
by the misleading encouragement of patronage and
compromise. We have no right to help minds and
consciences into a bondage which, when embraced,
separates the bondsman from humanity—the Church
with its theocracy on one side : Humanity with the
devil on the other side: such is the Papal concep
tion. And, alas ! the separation between the Papal
subject and Humanity is complete: the outward
tokens of courtesy or affection may be observed ; but
what love worth anything can exist between the
blessed and the accursed; what even are the ministra
tions of mercy, if they are so designed, as out of
men’s affections and afflictions to forge the rivets of
their servitude ?
When we cease the legislation of religious favourit
ism, and commence the legislation of religious equality
—when we treat all sects and institutions with justice,
and the members of all sects and institutions with
courtesy as well as justice—then shall we be in a
position to apply the principles of common sense to
conventual institutions. If the friends of conventual
institutions realised the wide-spread dislike engen
dered by the multiplication of institutions where a
two-fold absolutism is veiled in entire secresy, they
would be the first to seek a safeguard. The odious
system of direction which during the last few years
has been pervading the Roman Catholic laity, we are
powerless to touch. But the friends of religious
equality should warn any persons if they are carrying
on a secresy which could be remedied, but which if
�22
’The Vatican Decrees
continued will ere long lead to an outburst of indigna
tion, a panic, and a persecution. Why should not
gentlemen who have relations in convents and com
munities of men—why should not the superiors of
such institutions propose a plan calculated to meet
real and known inconveniences, and thus, moreover,
to calm the just susceptibilities of the public mind ?
There ought to be a register preserved in the guest
room of every religious house, in which the real names
of all inmates should be entered; inaccuracy of entry
should be punishable by a fine; any person who could
assign a rational reason should, under suitable restric
tions, be enabled to examine such register. All this
might be arranged so as not to cause any inconvenience
to a conventual institution, but, above all, so as not
to affix any stigma of dishonour or apparent suspicion.
Nearly all the unpleasant rumours against convents
would have been suppressed at once had a precaution
so simple and inoffensive been adopted ; and, without
dragging into print allusions to excellent communi
ties of innocent and good people, I may be allowed to
remark that occasionally there have been incidents,
such as imbecile inmates kept in durance and also
sometimes persons secreting themselves in conventual
houses, and so evading the law, which easily give
countenance to those countless suspicions which keep
aggregating till they descend like an avalanche. The
true friends of lasting religious equality must combine,
along with the maintenance of these great principles,
to abolish favouritism, and to adopt in a spirit of fair
ness and consideration, remedies demanded, not by
bigotry, but by good sesne.
Let me remark, in conclusion, that all my state
ments as to the Papal doctrines imposed on NeoCatholics are founded, as may be easily verified, on
direct quotations from the Decrees and the Encyclical.
Much more remains behind—unsaid.
�and the “Expostulation”
23'
NOTE.
The book formerly deemed the best for the diffusion
of Roman Catholic doctrines was Keenan’s ‘ Controver
sial Catechism.’ It was based on a French Catechism,
and very widely circulated in Great Britain, bearing
the imprimatur of all the Vicars Apostolic of Scot
land. In it appeared the following, until withdrawn
in the year 1869 :—
Q.—Must not Catholics believe the Pope himself
to be infallible ?
A.—This is a Protestant invention : it is no Article
of the Catholic Faith ; no decision of his can oblige,
under pain of heresy, unless it be received and
enforced by the teaching body—that is by the Bishops
of the Church.
ADDRESS.
The following is a quotation from an address
delivered by the Rev. James Martineau at Liverpool,
September 25th, 1871, fourteen months after my
secession from the Roman Catholic Church. In
gratefully mentioning that ever-honoured and beloved
name, may I be permitted to record that, trained as I
had been to lean on the authority of others, my know
ledge of the existence of such a spiritual character as
his, developed in the ranks of Christian Theism, pre
sented to my hopes an encouragement and a stimulus
which the gentle diffidence of his genius would
neither have desired or imagined -
�24
The Vatican Decrees
“ Another event has taken place recently with which
I have had in some degree the privilege of a personal
connection. A very eminent and remarkable man
has given up his adherence to the Catholic religion,
and has thrown himself among us as a preacher of pure
and spiritual religion. I allude to the Rev. Robert
Rodolph Suffield. Now, before Mr. Suffield’s name
was heard amongst us, at his own request I early paid
him a visit at his retreat in the country. I had inti
mate intercourse with him, and learned precisely his
state of thought before he had made up his mind to
the step he has now taken, and I was equally struck
with the problem which was presented to his religious
sense — what is the real essence and nature of
Catholicism ? Now, I found that the view Mr. Suffield
took of Catholicism was this. He said, ‘ I see in the
Catholic religion the only example in the world’s
history in which the great and fundamental principles
of all natural piety and of all natural conscience are
made the actuating principles of the life of multitudes
and of nations. The great doctrine of the moral
government of God, the great truth of the absolute
supremacy of conscience, the great hope of a future
and better life—these things have imbued the Catholic
mind, the mind even of the youngest children of the
Catholic Church that have any intelligence at all.
They are realities to the Catholic people. They speak
of them with the same simplicity and openness with
which they would speak of the work of their plough,
of their spade, of their shuttle; with which they would
speak of the concerns of their houses and their homes.
There is no shyness concerning them. They are ab
solute realities to them, and rule their lives. We
know that they control the passions of young people,
and, if they go astray, by appealing to these images
in their hearts we can recover them again. They are
truly a power in life. And now,’ said Mr. Suffield,
‘ what I want to know is, whether outside the Catholic
�and the “Expostulation”
25
Church those truths have the same power and reality,
whether they take their places among the facts of life
with the same certainty and with the same efficacy.’
He looked upon the Catholic religion simply as an
instrumentality for bringing home to men the simple
natural convictions of the human heart, and making
them live in their consciences and lives. Catholicism
thus was to him nothing but a great system of natural
religion supported by the most artificial and unnatural
of authorities and supports. That is the view he took
of it, and he said, ‘ What I want to know is, if I dare
to throw away these artificial supports, shall I find it
possible to administer this spiritual theism to man
kind, and get hold of the hearts of men ? Or am I
to believe that it is impossible for the weak mind of
humanity to grapple those truths, unless you have a
false mythology, and all sorts of pictures and images
connected with them ? Does the religion enter by
means of the false imagination, or may we fling away
the false imagination and trust to the spiritual power
of religion ?’ That was the problem he had to solve
for himself, and he said, ‘I fear if I were to profess
myself a Protestant I should be propping up these
eternal truths with just as false and entangled a ma
chinery as if I were to remain in the Catholic Church,
Por, if there is no infallibility in the Catholic Church,
neither is there in the Protestant Scriptures, and
whether I take the one or the other, I throw away
natural truths, and fling myself instead on an artificial
and unnatural support.’ Well, I believe myself that
Mr. Suffield here expressed a great truth ; and I think
the changes which are now taking place in the Pro
testant Churches are all of this kind. The tendency
is to fling away the false dependence upon artificial
authority, and to go back to the primitive rights of
religion in human nature and in human life. I said
to him I should feel it an impiety and infidelity—the
only thing I should venture to call infidelity at all—
�i6
The Vatican Decrees
to doubt that what God had made true could vindicate
and justify itself to the human heart without any
human lies to back it up and support it. If we once
found that a thing was a lie, and was false, or even if
it was precarious, it was at the peril of all veracity
and of all fidelity that we dared to place that as a
means of underpinning, as it were, and supporting
an eternal and all-important truth.”
RESULTS OF INFALLIBILITY.
Meanwhile there are already signs of a coming conflict in
quarters where they might hardly have been looked for.
There is probably no section of the Church, beyond the walls
of Rome itself, where the dominant spirit is so fiercely and
fervently Ultramontane as among the Roman Catholics of
England. Nor is the phenomenon difficult to account for.
They form a small body in the midst of an unfriendly popu
lation, and the old Catholic families are at once united toge
ther and inspired with zeal by the long tradition of privations
and persecutions patiently endured for their faith. And then,
at the moment when legal disabilities and social ostracism
were beginning to be relaxed, came the irruption of converts
who had sacrificed most of them all the associations, inte
rests, and affections of half a lifetime for their adopted creed,
and whose leaders, as one of themselves has observed, were
withone illustrious exception, “ Ultramontanes before they
were Catholics.” The late Cardinal Wiseman, whose earlier
policy was of a very different kind, was completely carried
away by the current; his successor has been throughout the
guiding spirit of the infallibilist bishops at the Council, and
all the younger generation of priests have been trained on
the convert model. One of them insisted not long ago,
from the pulpit of a well-known Roman Catholic church
in the metropolis, that it is not to believe the infallibility of
the Pope’s official judgments ; every opinion on whatever
subject he expresses in conversation is infallible. Yet a reso
lute opposition is beginning to manifest itself among both
the clergy and laity of the Roman Catholic Church in Eng
land. We have given several examples of this before now,
and we mentioned the other day that the infallibilist address
presented under strong pressure for the adoption of the Eng
lish clergy had been by no means unanimously signed. Dr.
�and the “Expostulation.”
2"]
Rymer, President of the diocesan Seminary of St. Edmund’s,
Ware, scandalised the Tablet by writing to express his em
phatic disapproval of it. But the tone and language of the
letter of refusal addressed to its promoters by Father Suf
field, and published apparently by his ^request in the West
minster Gazette, is so remarkable that it deserves record
here. The writer is the best known and one of the ablest
and most active of the English Dominicans—a Cambridge
man, though not, we believe, a convert; and it is hardly
likely, considering the stringent discipline of religious com
munities, that he would venture on so bold a protest unless
he felt, assured of the moral support of his Order; and such
an inference is strongly confirmed by the attitude of the
Dominican Cardinal Guidi. Father Suffield says :—
“Knowing with what earnest desire the enemies of our
religion, with taunting speech, at once urge us and defy us to
proclaim, after 1,800 years, the foundation of our Christianity;
knowing the deep repugnance with which, under the pressure
of ecclesiastical opinion and ecclesiastical prospects, canons,
priests, and bishops, have signed declarations pleasing to
ecclesiastical superiors, and repugnant to their private opinions ;
knowing with an intimate and sad knowledge that the moot
ing of this question has led to investigations, and then to
inquiries, which have paralysed the faith in the minds of
numbers of the clergy and of the intellectual laity, and with
not a few destroyed it, I must respectfully decline to sign a
document in which petitioners ask for a definition, the animus
and consequence of which few can be so thoughtless as not to
perceive.
“If we get a Pope vain, obstinate, and in his dotage, shall
we ask him to be confirmed in his powers of mischief ?
“Do we wish, by exalting the lessons of the encyclical, to
render political life impossible to every honest and consistent
Catholic, and to render the possession of political and religious
equality impracticable to any except those sort of Catholics
who would use the language of liberty when they beg, and
the precepts of the Pope when they refuse ? ”
x It is scarcely possible to misapprehend the pointed allusion
to the case of “ a Pope vain, obstinate, and in his dotage,”
and the majority of the Vatican Council has certainly done
what it can to “confirm him in his powers of mischief.”
Father Suffield must be presumed to speak from his own
knowledge when he refers to the numbers of clergy and
educated laity whose faith has been already paralysed or
destroyed by inquiries into Papal infallibility, and his testi
mony is borne out by others ; it is hardly wonderful that he
should look with serious alarm at the further consequences
�28
The Vatican Decrees
that may ensue. The wonder is that those who wish faith
to be maintained and strengthened should be so “ thoughtless ”
as to exult over the “mischief” they have helped to perpe
trate. It is rather late to remind them now of the homely
proverb that the last straw will break the camel’s back, and
this straw is a tolerably weighty one.—Saturday Review, of
July 30th, 1870.
FATHER SUFFIELD AND THE NEW DOGMA.
The newspapers inform us that Father Suffield, late of the
Dominican Order, has joined the Unitarian community; he
has not only renounced his obedience to the Church of Rome,
but has apparently renounced also his obedience to the
Catholic Faith. This is very sad, yet not unexpected after
reading his last published letters. The case is one that arrests
our attention, not only on account of the learning and abilities
of Father Suffield, but because it will form, we fear, only a
type of many such cases ; nor is this difficult to understand.
Brought up with the principle, instilled from earliest child
hood, that the Church of Rome is alone the Catholic Church,
excluding the Orthodox and the Anglican; that the supre
macy of the Pope over the whole Catholic world is the normal
idea of the Church, so completely that those who do not
acknowledge that supremacy are cut off from the promises and
privileges of the Church, even though, like Greeks and
Anglicans, they retain all else necessary to their continuing
portions of the Body of Christ; with these opinions so strongly
impressed on the mind, it is inevitable that there must be a
most violent reaction when the dogma of Infallibility is made
an article of Faith by what claims to be a General Council.
For this dogma is not only a new article of Faith, but it is one
which contradicts much that had been previously held as true ;
it virtually rejects the authority of General Councils as the
voice of the Church, and thus places the Church herself in a
new position. By removing the supreme authority from the
Body, and placing it in one man, who is supposed to be the
head, the original Charter as granted by her Divine Head is
abrogated, and a new one substituted for it. It is no longer,
“Tell it to the Church,” it is “Tell it to the Pope;” it is no
longer,” “If he neglect to hear the Church, let him be unto
thee as an heathen man and a publican; ” but, “ If he neglect
to hear the Pope ”—very naturally the Faith of those who
have been educated, as Father Suffield has been, by Do
minicans, will be violently shaken, and their minds thrown
off their balance, when they are called upon by the authority
�and the “ Expostulation.”
nt)
of the Church to accept the decree of the personal Infallibility
of the Pope. And this reaction is very liable to go to further
lengths than we at first anticipate ; we are apt to expect that
those who, like Father Suffield, repudiate the dogma, and con
sequently find their position as Priests in the Roman Church
untenable, will turn to the Anglican. We should rejoice to
think that the Anglican would form a safe home for those who
reject the dogma, but we fear it will not be so; we are far
more afraid that Father Suffield’s example will be followed
by larger numbers than those who seek refuge with us. We
do not sufficiently consider the habits of thought and mind
which are formed by Roman teaching. In that community
the whole Catholic Faith is wrapped up in, and becomes a part
of, the belief in the Papal Supremacy ; the very rudiments of
the Faith, the Incarnation, the Holy Trinity, the Sacraments,
are all tied up in the idea of the sole supremacy of the Church
of Rome, and the Pope at the head of it; the idea of the
Catholic Church or any part existing, except under the Roman
obedience, is entirely excluded as impossible. When, there
fore, a rude shock comes like this, which destroys all faith in
the Pope and the Roman Church, it destroys all faith in other
dogmas too.—Church Herald.
The dogma of Infallibility is producing its necessary fruit.
Not even Rome can altogether stop inquiry or fetter thought,
and spiritual absolutism finds its own subjects ready to ques
tion its decrees. Already there is a movement in Germany
which bears striking resemblance to that of the fifteenth cen
tury. A meeting of Roman Catholic professors at Nuremberg
has already agreed upon a protest against the spiritual despot
ism of the Pope, and the Cologne Gazette states that the
Bishop of Rothenberg, Dr. Hefele, has resolved not to accept
the Infallibility Dogma, and that his Chapter and the theo
logical faculty of the city of Tubingen support him in it.
Even in this country, where Roman Catholicism is more
Roman than Rome, the dogma is producing confusion and
distress in the minds of the faithful.
As the immediate result of the Council’s work, the secession
of Father Suffield from the Church of Rome is worthy of more
notice than is due to merely individual change of opinion.
Father Suffield is a man to whom the Roman Catholics of
England are willing to confess large obligations. He is said
to have revived the establishment of Peter’s Pence in this
country, to have done much in recruiting the regiment of
Papal Zouaves, and to have held the first public meeting of
sympathy for the Pope ever held in modern England. A
�3°
The Vatican Decrees
correspondent of the Westminster Gazette says, “it has been
impossible to have been much under Father Sumeld’s influence
without becoming intensely devoted to everything Catholic,”
and that “the Prayer-book connected with his name has pro
bably been more instrumental than any other popular manual
in spreading faith wherever English-speaking Catholics are to
be found. ” The Prior of the Dominican House in London, of
which order Father Suffield is a prominent member, speaks of
him as “ a brother of the same order, Whose personal friend
ship I enjoyed before either of us became Dominicans, and
whose zeal and apostolic spirit I have ever held in the greatest
admiration.”
But Father Suffield seems to have felt somewhat as Father
Newman felt, that though the Infallibility was a dogma to be
received as an act of devotion, it was not to be defended as an
article of the faith. “It becomes essential,” he says, “that
unless failure of reason be impossible to an aged Pope, there
should be some means at least of recognising when his decrees
are to be regarded as the acts of man, when as those of God.”
The shock of disagreement and difference which has been
caused by the proclamation of the Infallibility dogma has,
however, shaken the whole fabric of the eloquent Dominican’s
creed. “An incident, not regretted by me,” he says, “has
revealed, almost by accident, the hidden struggle of years.”
Of this struggle he says, “it has been the agony of years.”
His doubts have not risen from within, but have been forced
upon him from without. He “ sought solitude first in the
cloister, then solitude greater in a country village amidst
simple people and the children of his flock, that he might
dispel difficulties and doubts. If those difficulties and doubts
have been wrong, none but the highest rulers of the Church
have been responsible for them; they have not been a pleasure,
but an agony; not a pride, but a humiliation.” Father
Suffield has, therefore, been driven out of the Church by the
declaration of the Papal Infallibility. His case is simply one
of thousands, and is only rendered remarkable by his own
previous services to the Church. The Pope and his Council
have raised more doubts than they will solve, and in grasping
at the shadow of Infallibility they will miss the substance of
authority.—Daily News.
Father Suffield, the eloquent Dominican, whose protest
against the most memorable act of the Vatican Council has
excited some attention in this country, has gone a step beyond
the rejection of the dogma of Papal Infallibility. He has
quitted the Roman Communion. It would seem that as soon
�and the “Expostulation”
31
as the fact became known overtures were made to him with
the view of his joining the Anglican Church. He has declined
to do so. The Articles and the Athanasian Creed block the
way; indeed he “ questions alike the Infallibility of the Pope
and of the Scriptures.” He throws in his lot with “those
who are commonly called Unitarians, Free Christians or
Christian Theists,” and states, in effect, that he intends to
accept the office of a minister in a Free Christian Congrega
tion.—Manchester Guardian.
A. due following out of opinions curiously led Dr. Newman
to the Roman Church, and his brother, Professor Newman,
to pure Theism. In like manner the two Herberts—the one
the free-thinking Lord Herbert of Cherbury, the other the
sainted poet of the English Church : these men felt the philo
sophical impossibility of a middle position. We shall watch
Mr. Suffield’s career with high interest. He will not go in
with the company of Exeter Hall, but sets forth alone in
his quest of truth. There is something very touching, and
very manly too, in his statement of the sufferings of mind and
heart, “which his secession has involved.” Father Suffield
has taken the great leap from authority to freedom.—Dispatch.
FATHER SUFFIELD AND THE CHURCH OF
ENGLAND.
August 22, 1870.
My Dear Sir,—Private communications are so very numer
ous at present, that I cannot conveniently add to my occupa
tions by contributing the literary help you do me the favour
of offering. Moreover that able periodical partakes somewhat
of a controversial character, and is regarded as anti-Catholic
in its position. I am peculiarly circumstanced, have resigned
all offices in the Catholic Church, and ceased the exercise of
priestly and Catholic rites : from the intimate manner in
which I have been interwoven in the Catholic body in England,
this act causes great pain to those whom the least I should
like to wound ; and I am anxious to do nothing but what is
demanded by the exigencies of circumstances or the require
ments of conscience, which could in the slightest degree
grieve those who have so many claims upon my affection,
gratitude, and reverence.
After long and deep thought, study, prayer, and counsel, I
decided that it would be impossible for me honestly to
continue to act as a priest. The infallibility of the Pope, and,
�32
The Vatican Decrees
of the Scriptures, alike, I question, and the dogmas resting
solely on either of those authorities, I am not able on that
account to admit.
It is my desire to unite with others, and to assist them in
the worship of God, and in the practice of the two-fold
precepts of charity, unfettered by adhesion on either side, to
anything, beyond those great fundamental principles as
presented to us by Jesus Christ.
Though relieved from all the obligations of my order, I do
not wish to consider myself as alienated from the Catholic
Church or from other Christian communities, by any personal
hostile act. I assume a position hostile to none—if one man
hurls an anathema, another man is not compelled either to
accept it, or to retaliate it.
Having understood that those who are commonly called Uni
tarians, Free Christians, or Christian Theists, thus agree in
the liberty inspired by self-diffidence, humility, and charity,
to carry on the worship of God, without sectarian requirements
or sectarian opposition; that they possess a simple but not
vulgar worship, a high standard of virtue, intelligence, and
integrity; and these after the Christian type, moulded by the
Christian traditions, and edified by the sacred Scriptures;
holding the spirit taught by Jesus Christ, and the great
thoughts by virtue of which he built up the ruins of the moral
world; and. yet not enforcing the reception of complicated
dogmas as a necessity, or accounting their rejection a crime :
a communion of Christian worshippers, bound loosely together,
and yet by the force of great principles enabled quietly to
maintain their position, to exercise an influence elevating and
not unimportant, and to present religion under an aspect which
thoughtful men can accept without latent scepticism, and
earnest men without the aberrations of superstition, or the
abjectness of mental servitude to another—such approved
itself to my judgment, and commended itself to my sympathy.
I intend adhering to the pursuits of the clergyman and of the
Christian teacher, and communications are in progress in
another part of England which may terminate in my accepting
thus a duty conformable to the habits of my life, and which
will not throw me into a position of hostility, or embarrassment
as to those honoured and loved Catholic friends with whom
so greatly I should prize, if it were possible to maintain kindly
intercourse, inasmuch as I am only externally severed from
them by my being unable to believe certain dogmas which a
Catholic is bound to regard as essential. Thus I hope I have
not only thanked you for your obliging offer, but adequately
explained my position, and showed that the future you were
commissioned to hold out to me in the Established Church
�and the “Expostulation.”
33
would not be deemed possible by the authorities who have
done me the honour and kindness to communicate in my
regard, as soon as they are made aware that the Articles and
the Athanasian creed would be amongst the insuperable
barriers to my entertaining such a proposal.
Many write to me evidently under a grievous misapprehen
sion. They anticipate from me reckless denunciations of that
vision of beauty which I have left, simply because, like a
vision, it had everything but reality. Allied as I am by
relationship with some of our ancient Catholic families, allied
by the ties of friendship with many more of them, I feel it is
a shame to myself that any stranger could suppose one word
of my lips, one thought of my mind, could cast moral reproach
on those beautiful and honoured homes where old traditions
received a lustre greater even than antiquity and suffering can
bestow—crowned with the aureola of charity, nobleness,
purity, and devotedness. Such memories print on my heart
their everlasting record. To cease to believe and to worship
with them was a martyrdom, which none but the Catholic can
understand.
I have ascended now to another stage of my life ; to rise to
it needed sufferings of the mind and of the heart, the sacrifice
of everything in the world I cared for;—but I perceive a work
to do, and, by the blessing of God, I shall strive to perform
it. Youth, strength, vigour, and hope return to me with the
expectation. Truth obtained by suffering is doubly dear to
the possessor.—Very sincerely yours,
Robert Rodolph Sutfield.
To the Rev.----- &c., &c.
N.B.—All the above paragraphs, from different periodicals,
are extracted from Church Opinion.
�ALSO,
By the Bev. B. B. SUFFIELD,
FIVE LETTERS ON CONVERSION TO ROMAN
CATHOLICISM......................................................... 3d.
IS JESUS GOD ?........................................................ 3d.
TRUBNER
and
CO., LUDGATE HILL, LONDON, E.C.
PRINTED BY C. W. BBYNBLL, LITTLE PULTENBY STREET, HAYMARKET.
�
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Title
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Victorian Blogging
Description
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A collection of digitised nineteenth-century pamphlets from Conway Hall Library & Archives. This includes the Conway Tracts, Moncure Conway's personal pamphlet library; the Morris Tracts, donated to the library by Miss Morris in 1904; the National Secular Society's pamphlet library and others. The Conway Tracts were bound with additional ephemera, such as lecture programmes and handwritten notes.<br /><br />Please note that these digitised pamphlets have been edited to maximise the accuracy of the OCR, ensuring they are text searchable. If you would like to view un-edited, full-colour versions of any of our pamphlets, please email librarian@conwayhall.org.uk.<br /><br /><span><img src="http://www.heritagefund.org.uk/sites/default/files/media/attachments/TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" width="238" height="91" alt="TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" /></span>
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Conway Hall Library & Archives
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2018
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Conway Hall Ethical Society
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Pamphlet
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Title
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The Vatican decrees and the "Expostulation"
Creator
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Suffield, Robert Rodolph
Description
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Place of publication: London
Collation: 16 p. ; 18 cm.
Notes: Part of Morris Misc. Tracts 4. Other titles published by Trubner and Co. by the same author listed on back page. Includes a long quotation from an address delivered by the Rev. James Martineau at Liverpool, September 25th,1871.
Publisher
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Trubner and Co. ; Thomas Scott
Date
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1874
Identifier
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G4868
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Catholic Church
Papacy
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<a href="http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/"><img src="http://i.creativecommons.org/p/mark/1.0/88x31.png" alt="Public Domain Mark" /></a><span> </span><br /><span>This work (The Vatican decrees and the "Expostulation"), identified by </span><a href="https://conwayhallcollections.omeka.net/items/show/www.conwayhall.org.uk"><span>Humanist Library and Archives</span></a><span>, is free of known copyright restrictions.</span>
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application/pdf
Type
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Text
Language
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English
Catholic Church-Doctrines
Popes-Infallibility