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Text
ON
CHURCH PEDIGREES.
BY THE
REV. T. P. KIRKMAN, M.A., F.RS.
PUBLISHED BY THOMAS SCOTT,
MOUNT PLEASANT, RAMSGATE.
1871.
Price Sixpence.
�4*
LONDON :
.-PRINTED BY C. W. <RETNELL, LITTLE PULTENEY STREET-
HAYMARKET, W.
�ON
CHURCH
PEDIGREES.
-------- ♦--------
N the monthly paper for August, 1871, of the
National Society we read as follows: “ In the
present condition of Church Schools, it is more than
ever necessary that they should be made the nurseries
of Church principles. . . . Leaving the teacher to act
as pioneer, the clergyman must follow on to turn to
good account the basis of fact which the teacher has
laid in the minds of the children. He will naturally
be occupied with the two highest classes, as those
which are soonest to leave school, and perhaps to
slip altogether from his grasp. Before they do so,
they should be furnished with reasons for holding
fast the faith they have been taught. They ought to
know why they should be Churchmen, and not Dis
senters ; why they should go to Church, and not to
meeting; why they should be Anglicans, and not
Romanists. The time has come when probably the
whole fate of the Church of England will turn upon
the hold she may have upon the rising generation.”
There is a sweet harmony in the discord of our
sectarians. With one voice all the leaders of the
wrangling denominations applaud the wisdom of
this manifesto. Conceal but the Church colours of
the herald who blows that trumpet, and the Romish
sacrificer, the Presbyterian priest, the Calvinist soul-
I
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On Church Pedigrees.
smiter, the Methodist soul-saver—all feel the same
inspiration at the sound, and each slaps his thigh,
exclaiming, “ Just my sentiments.” “We have been
losing our time and pain in trying to convince men :
that was very proper in the days of the Apostles,
when men were nearly all children; but it is folly
now. Men now are grown men; they will not listen,
they cannot understand. It does not pay to furnish
men with reasons—we must take to furnishing the
pates of children. All our lessons to men about hold
ing fast the faith seem only to loosen their grip of it.
It is painful to see how regardless the men are be
coming both of our precept and of our example.
They see how cordially I and my brethren hate those
other parties; how diligently we shun them, ignore
their very existence, and take it for granted, in all
our private and public life, that there are no real
Christians but ourselves; and yet these men will
mingle and act like friends and brothers in busi
ness and social enjoyment. In vain do we pen them
up on Sundays, labouring to tone, to colour, and to
starch them. They will run together over the six
days all of one tint like milk and water, and the best
starch we put into them will hardly stand ten minutes’
rain of God’s perpetual and unsectarian mercies. Our
Church’s fate turns not on her power to convince
grown men, but “ upon the hold she may have on the
rising generation.” Everyman of us must gird himself to a desperate fight for these little ones; he must
catch them and keep them, and cram them well with
reasons “ before they slip altogether from his grasp !”
What kind of reasons should they be ? Of course,
few and simple, easy to comprehend and remember.
We cannot do better than take a lesson from the
Romish priest. Is it not wonderful that after three
centuries of perpetual bombardment by the shells of
Protestantism he still stands his ground, and seems so
�On Church Pedigrees.
7
little the worse ? What can account for this ? I
know his. secret, my sectarian friend; and I will im
part it to you. It lies all in the doctrine of Churchpedigree. Nothing like a pedigree to charm the
imagination of the young and ignorant. The Romish
priest has a thorough contempt for texts and reasons;
he lays his firm foundation in the tender mind of
infancy by teaching one thing—pedigree. Talk to
the average Roman Catholic; he knows nothing, and
cares nothing about your Scripture. He goes farther
back than Scripture. He stands by his Church, now
that he is a man, exactly for the reasons which
kindled his childhood’s love and loyalty; not because
she is Scriptural, but because she is Apostolic. Apos
tolic !—that is a word which many of you sharp
sectarians appear to have forgotten. Only see what
energy this one simple phrase of Apostolic succession
has lately infused into the slumbering Church of
England ! The most ignorant Roman Catholic can
tell you how God came down from heaven, and taught
the Catholic religion to his Apostles; how exactly
they all learned it alike, and unanimously handed it
on, pure and undefiled, to the first Catholic bishops,
who have continued to teach and transmit it without
changing a single hair to those who succeeded them.
Those bishops have it still exactly as the inspired
and consenting Apostles taught it to all nations by
the gift of tongues, so that the Catholic hears from
the lips of his clergy the very voice of the Apostles,
and the voice of the God who instructed them.
Herein consists the strength of the Romanist: he
cares little for texts and less for logic; but he knows
and glories in his Church’s pedigree !
Come, then, “ Come on, my partners in distress,”—
as Wesley puts it—let us try in our Protestant fashion
to get a few notions about our pedigree. We are,
of course, bound to deduce them from Scripture; as
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On Church Pedigrees.
we have conceded io our people a free and open Bible.,
we must find our heraldry there. About what Scrip
ture means in the half-dozen texts which each of us
calls the truth and the faith we have disputed longenough with little profit; let us try to study together
this one question of Apostolic consent and unity. If
we can convince our hearers that we have our theo
logical light and wisdom from a unanimous college
of Protestant Apostles (Conformist or Nonconformist,
Episcopalian or Methodist, as our needs require), we
shall probably commend it to their loyalty and zeal
by this consideration of pedigree far better than by
any more learned reasons.
It is evidently in the “ Acts of the Apostles ” that
we are to look for the desired demonstration of Apos
tolic unanimity. If we succeed in establishing it as
the root of our own Church pedigree, we shall have
the very best reason for the furniture of our young
people’s minds; and if we succeed in disproving it,
we shall at least have spiked the biggest gun of the
Romanist. Let us proceed to the investigation of
Apostolic inspiration and united infallibility in matters
of faith and doctrine.
We read in our margined New Testament (Acts
xv.) that in the year 51 A.D., some twenty years after
the death of Jesus, “ certain men which came down
from Judasa taught the brethren, and said, except ye
be circumcised after the manner of Moses, ye cannot
be saved: when, therefore, Paul and Barnabas had
no small dissension and disputation with them, they
determined that Paul and Barnabas, and certain
other of them, should go up to Jerusalem unto the
Apostles and elders about this question.” This took
place at the Syrian Antioch, where the disciples were
first called Christians, and where Paul and Barnabas,
after returning from a great missionary tour among
the heathen, had been abiding for some years. “ And
�On Church Pedigrees.
9 ■
when they were come to Jerusalem, they were received
of the Church and of the Apostles and elders, and
they declared all things that God had done for them.
But there arose up certain of the Pharisees which
believed, saying that it was needful to circumcise
them, and to command them to keep the law of Moses.
And the Apostles and elders came together for to
consider this matter.”
There is not a word in this statement in the Acts
from which it can be directly inferred that there was
any difference of opinion between Paul and the
Apostles at Jerusalem, concerning the obligation
upon the Gentile converts to observe the Mosaic
religion. All the trouble is made to spring from
certain nameless men who went down to Antioch
without commission, as we are afterwards informed,
from the Apostles, and from certain unnamed be
lieving Pharisees in Jerusalem. Nor is it distinctly
affirmed that Paul and any of the other Apostles held
discordant views about the obligation of a converted
Jew to continue or to neglect the observance of the
Mosaic law, in the matter of ceremonial, diet, or
sacrifice. In the speech of the President James of
this first Council, as it is called, and in the Decree
issued for the religious guidance of the Gentile con
verts, which is contained in this chapter xv., all
determination of the obligations of the Hebrew Chris
tians is avoided by the incontestable remark, “ Moses
hath of old time in every city them that preach him,
being read in the synagogues every Sabbath day.”
Between the Gentile Christian and the Mosaic Jew
the line is definitely drawn; between the Christian
and the non-Christian Jew no line is drawn, nor is
the existence of such line hinted, as marking any
difference whatever of Mosaic practice or profession.
The Gentiles are instructed in the ritual, self-denial,
and diet which they were bound as Christian men to
�IO
On Church Pedigrees.
observe ; namely, to abstain from pollutions of idols',,
from fornication, from things strangled, and from
blood. The Christian Jews are simply referred to
the teaching of the law in the synagogues to which
they and their fathers had always been accustomed.
I grant that the speech of James in that reference
does not expressly enjoin the old obedience to that
teaching of the synagogue; neither does it sanctionany even the slightest relaxation of Mosaic obliga
tions—not even in the matter of temple sacrifice.
The decree leaves us in utter darkness about what
Apostolic authority demanded or dismissed from a
J ewish Christian in the matter of Mosaic observance.
The obvious, I do not say the necessary, inference
from all this history of the council and decree of
Jerusalem is that the Apostles and elders in that city
expected the Hebrew Christians to continue without
change the observance of the ritual religion of their
Jewish fathers, and that this was their own practice
and intention: that they were, and expected each
other to remain, not a whit less arrant Mosaic Jews
for all their profession of belief in Christ Jesus. This
inference appears reasonable and natural, although
the historian in the Acts has carefully avoided draw
ing that inference, or saying one word that he could
avoid, that should tempt his reader to draw it.
I am aware that few of my readers will allow for
a moment the correctness of such an inference,
Romanists, Anglicans, and Dissenters will protest
against its absurdity. To suppose that the first
Christians at Jerusalem, after hearing the inspired
Apostles of Jesus preach the gospel for twenty
years, remained arrant Mosaic Jews! It may be
all quite wrong.to suspect or to suppose this: the
supposition is assuredly gaining ground with learned
and critical students of the New Testament; still it
may be all a delusion of unbelieving science. All
�On Church Pedigrees.
II
that I would beg the reader candidly to consider is
the number and plausibility of the arguments which,
if we look entirely away from the Churches, sects,
and creeds of this century, and confine ourselves in
the spirit of true Protestants to the study of the
Christian Scriptures, and nothing else, present them
selves in favour of this supposition. These arguments
are now old among thinkers : it is not in my power
to add anything to the clearness with which they
have often been urged : but as nineteen out of twenty
readers of the New Testament in this country, among
both the teachers and the taught, are as unconscious
of their force, and often of their existence, as the
peasants of Connaught or Sicily are of the nature of
Protestant reasoning against the teaching of their
priests, it may be a contribution not without its value
to the slow but certain progress of God’s holy truth,
on my part, to state the way in which they strike
myself. My reader and I, whoever he may be, are
agreed on this, that Christianity, just as it has grown
and triumphed, and just as it is now working for good,
with all its contradictions and conflicts, is the greatest
fact in the history of this planet, far exceeding in
dignity all other topics in the grand epic of human
progress ; and that the study of its birth and growth
is something nobler than the study of languages and
nationalities, of dynasties and constitutions. And
why should we not be agreed also on this,—that the
only account of the origin and development of God’s
work of Christianity which is really worth our know
ing, is God’s own account of it, as He has left it
stamped on its earliest records in the New Testa
ment ? God’s own account of it! the way in which
He made it spring out of the elements and combina
tions, of its birth-place; this is what we want to
know. Shall we listen to the priest or the preacher
who cries, “ Beware of reading the roll of the sane-
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On Church Pedigrees.
tuary with the spectacles of carnal reason. The
account of the rise of Christianity which you want
for your soul’s salvation is exactly my account; for
that alone is orthodox and holy. No matter how true
before the tribunal of science may be the historical
inferences which Biblical criticism deduces from the
record, no matter how harmoniously her arrangement
of all the facts may fit together, it is perilous and
abominable if it differs from my Church's story, and
damages my Church’s pedigree.” Shall we listen to
him ? This is the gentleman who cursed the fine
calculations of Copernicus, and damned the telescope
of Galileo; the spectre who so terrified the former
that he never dared to publish what his Maker had
secretly whispered to him about his creation, nor
ever till just at his dying hour could feast his eye on
the printed product of his genius ; the wretch who
stormed over the latter with the instruments of
torture and of fire, and compelled him, in his grey
h^irs, to recant and deny the glorious truth which
God Himself had revealed to him !
Let us examine the facts recorded in this fifteenth
chapter of the Acts with the eye of common sense.
The first question that suggests itself is,—What
manner of men were these who went down to Antioch
from Jerusalem to teach the brethren? Something
better than fanatical fools they must have been.
Such an errand of mere fools would never have
found its way into the brief and well-written history
of the Acts, even if it be (and it does not profess to
be otherwise) an uninspired composition. Silly
fanatics would hardly have brought out such antago
nists as Paul and Barnabas; it was “ no small dis
sension and disputation ” which those holy Apostles
had to face from these Jerusalem teachers and their
party at Antioch. And it is impossible for us to
believe that the raving of wrong-headed dunces, who
�On Church Pedigrees.
ij
had nobody to back them, would have so moved the
Church in that city, that “they determined that Paul
and Barnabas, and certain others with them, should
go up to Jerusalem to the Apostles and elders about
this question.” They could hardly be a knot of un
instructed nobodies, or a new sect of mushroom
fanatics suddenly sprung up outside the area of
apostolic unanimity and infallibility, who could raise
such a commotion at Antioch, and cause an appeal
to be made from the arguments of the inspired Paul
and of the eloquent Barnabas to the College of
Apostles and elders at Jerusalem. In the Codex
Bezse, which is considered by many’ of the learned to
be the most important manuscript of the Gospels and
the Acts, which it has pleased the Popes and their
holy pokers to preserve for us, these men are said to
have come from Jerusalem, and to have charged or
summoned Paul, Barnabas, and the others to that city
to submit themselves to the judgment of the Apostles
and elders on this question. There is a wonderful
interest in these bits of ancient biblical literature : in
one point of view, it is like determining by spectrum
analysis that the far-distant stars are composed of
these earthly elements ; in another, it is like trying
to judge from^the fragments of human bones in
the barrows of Yorkshire, whether the earliest
barbarians of Britain were or were not cannibals.
The commentators all dispose of these zealous
gentlemen in the briefest possible manner as Judaizing teachers, a sort of semi-Christian borderers
on the pure fold of the Apostolic Church, a sort of
parasitic growth on the less instructed portion of the
Christian body, to whom the infallible Apostles gave
no countenance, and who were certain to be put down
as decidedly by the inspired College at Jerusalem, as
they had been by Paul at Antioch. There is nothing
wonderful in the appearance of such sectaries, nor in
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On Church Pedigrees.
their zeal, however fanatical. What is there too mad
or monstrous to be believed about these ignorant and
bigoted Jews F But we have before us in this state
ment in the Acts not the action of a party outside
the fold of the Church, but inside it; they were not
afraid to face Paul and Barnabas; they were not
silenced by these high authorities ;—so far from that,
they seem to have compelled an appeal to the central
authority at Jerusalem, and to have betaken them
selves to that supreme court with the 'confidence of
men who had no lack of supporters then, but had
good reason to expect an infallible judgment in their
favour. £< No,” says the orthodox reader, ££ you are
now going too far; that they had supporters at Jeru
salem who were important enough to maintain their
views in the presence of the Apostles is plain from the
statement, in verse 5, of what took place before the
whole Church there:—‘ But there arose up certain
of the Pharisees which believed, saying, that it was
needful to circumcise them, and to command them to
keep the law of Moses.’ ” And that they were im
portant enough to be heard again on an occasion more
formal is clear; for the 6th and 7th verses inform
us that the Apostles met a second time ££ for to con
sider this matter,” and that there was “ much dis
puting.” 11 This cannot be denied,” continues the
reader ; “ but when you say that these Judaizers had
good reason to expect an infallible judgment in their
favour, you say what you can never prove. If you
really could prove that, you would scatter to the wind
every pretence of every Church to trace its pedigree
to a college of inspired and unanimous Apostles. It
is utterly absurd to suppose that the Apostles had all
preached our modern Gospel for twenty years with
supernatural power and light, and with that unfalter
ing consent which is implied in their infallibility, and
at the same time to suppose that there could be any
�On Church Pedigrees.
doubt possible to men in their senses as to Apostolic
opinions on a question so practical and elementary as
the necessity of circumcision and all the rest of the
Mosaic rites and sacrifices for the salvation of a
Christian man, even of a converted Jew, and a hun
dred times more, on the question of such necessity in
the case of a converted Gentile.”
The reader has a right to rebuke me for saying
more than I can prove from the explicit evidence of
the document before me. Yet I may remark that
there are in all sciences, and especially in history,
certainties of inference on which reliance can be very
safely placed. I grant that it is impossible to demon
strate by the testimony of the author of the Acts,
that the Apostles, in general, remained Mosaic
ritualists and sacrificers. Even if it be the truth
that most of them continued such to the end of their
days, and required all the Jewish believers in Christ
to do the like, it would be unreasonable to demand
explicit confession of that truth from the Acts. This
treatise had not for its object to state differences of
opinion between Paul and the rest of the Apostles ;
on the contrary, it displays a laudable intention to
exhibit those inspired men in harmony; but, from the
facts which it does preserve to us, compared with
Paul’s epistles, we can deduce about the real state of
sentiment and practice inferences which, to an
increasing number of thoughtful men, have all the
marks of historical certainty.
A more definite question may be asked concerning
the men who went down from Judeea to Antioch.
Who sent them on their errand ? In the decree of
the Council in this fifteenth chapter it is expressed
that they had not been commissioned by the whole
body of Apostles and elders. But, in the second
chapter of Paul’s Epistle to the Galatians, we read :
“ But, when Peter was come to Antioch, I withstood
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On Church Pedigrees.
him to the face, because he was to be blamed. For
before that certain came from James, he did eat with
the Gentiles ; but, when they were come, he withdrew
and separated himself, fearing them that were of the
■circumcision. And the other Jews dissembled with
him, insomuch that Barnabas was carried away with
their dissimulation.”
If the general opinion of divines is adopted, that
the “certain” who “came from James” were the
party described in Acts xv. as going down to
Antioch, our question is clearly answered. James,
the first Bishop of Jerusalem, sent them, and they
were so far from being fanatical nobodies, that Peter
was afraid of them, and immediately separated him
self from the brotherly intercourse with the Gentile
-converts which he had enjoyed along with Paul,
“fearing them that were of the circumcision.”
That the two parties of bigoted visitors at Antioch
were the same it is impossible to prove, and the
silence of the Acts about their finding Peter there, to
some will appear good evidence that the two parties
are different. But we have this certain fact towards
an answer to our question, that certain men did once
go from James at Jerusalem to Antioch, on the very
same errand which led thither the party named in
Acts xv. If they went once, and with such success
as to overawe Peter, and to carry away Barnabas
from the support of Paul, they would be likely enough
to go again armed with the same authority of James, to
encounter Paul and Barnabas in the absence of Peter.
That the errand was the same, whether the times
were or were not different, is plain from the words of
Paul which follow: “ But when I saw that they
walked not uprightly according to the truth of the
Gospel, I said unto Peter before them all, If thou,
being a Jew, livest after the manner of the Gentiles,
and not as do the Jews, why compellest thou the
�On Church Pedigrees.
ry
Gentiles to live as do the Jews ? ” Had Paul not
said this, it might have been pleaded that the effect of
these remonstrants on Peter was only to restrict his
social intercourse with the Gentiles ; but these words
make it certain to us that Peter, in separating himself
from Paul, was standing side by side with men who,
under the authority of James, were determined to
enforce upon the Gentile converts the keeping of the
whole Mosaic law.
If this is not the truth, there is a very ill service
done by St Paul to St James, in placing it on record
that these mischief-makers came from the head of
the church at Jerusalem. Was Paul a man likely thus
to bear false witness, or to employ a phrase carrying
with it all the poison of false witness, against a
brother Apostle ? He could so easily have saved
James from the charge of walking “not uprightly
according to the truth of the Gospel,” by recording
simply as the compiler of the Acts has done, that the
“ certain ” came from Jerusalem, or, more vaguely,
from Judasa. How can we explain this mention of
James in this painful statement, except by supposing
that Paul felt it to be his duty to saddle the right
horse ? If James really had nothing to do with this
tyrannous message from head-quarters, can we believe
that Paul would have stained his page with such an
insinuation ? Look at the matter in the light of
common sense, and consider the cautious manner in
which good men not inspired are wont to make use
of each other’s names in affairs involving a solemn
responsibility. Can you imagine that inspired Apostles
had less care for each other’s fame than ordinary
heads of departments have nowadays ?
We have already seen enough to shake our faith in
the foundation of all our Church pedigrees on an infal
lible and unanimous body of Apostles. We have seen
Paul, the one whose teachings are more clearly
�18
On Church Pedigrees.
handed down to us than those of any other, in
■open conflict with Peter, who, according to the Pope,
was the prince of the Apostles, not about the fact or
the topic of the hour, but about the fundamental con
ditions of Christian Church-membership; and we
have too much reason to suspect that James and the
whole college of the Jerusalem Apostles were all
justly and alike smitten by the censures of Paul, as
walking not uprightly according to the truth of the
Gospel. We are agreed, every church and sect among
us, that the rites and ceremonies, and, above all, the
sacrifices of the Mosaic law, were abolished by the
Christian Revelation. It was impossible for any man,
twenty years after the death of Jesus, to hold the
Catholic faith, and at the same time to remain in
communion with the Mosaic Church, adhering to the
old ritual, and cherishing the old contempt and hatred
of those who rejected that ritual. How could any
man pretend to believe in Christ as “ the Lamb with
out spot, who, by the sacrifice of himself once made,
should take away the sins of the world,” and yet
remain a frequenter of the temple service, and a par
taker in the butchering atonements of those Jewish
priests ?
We proceed to consider the history preserved to us
of this council of Jerusalem, in which we shall look
anxiously, first, for proof that the Apostles and elders
there, had no sympathy with these superstitious and
scornful bigots who went down to Antioch to insult
the Gentile believers, and, secondly, for evidence that
the heads of the Christian Church in the holy city
were no longer in bondage to the Mosaic ordinances ;
and we shall try to keep our eyes open in our exami
nation of the matter. It is natural for us to feel sur
prise that the Apostles should have condescended to
hold a public debate and council about the very first
propositions of Christian faith and fellowship. Honest
�On Church Pedigrees,
19
Adam Clarke feels this in his note on verse 7, and
makes the best of it thus: “Though the Apostles
and elders were under the inspiration of the Almighty,
and could by this inspiration have immediately deter
mined the question ; yet it was highly necessary that
the objecting party should be permitted to come for
ward, and allege their reasons for the doctrines they
preached, and that these reasons should be fairly met
by argument.” Does this diminish the wonder of the
reader that, in the centre of Christian light, where
infallible Apostles had been teaching men of all
nations for twenty years, such an objecting party
should exist at all, with any recognition as a portion
of the Catholic Church ? Twenty years I It is a
long time for a direct negation of Christian faith and
charity to pass unchallenged and unrebuked in the
presence of inspired and unanimous Apostles. At
what period, and under what instruction, during
those twenty years, could these sham Christians have
found admission into the fold of the faithful ? We
have no inspired Apostles now; yet converted Jews
do not rush from London into Lancashire to com
mand us to keep the Jewish Sabbath, to circumcise
our children, to patronise none but Hebrew butchers,
and to keep the whole Mosaic law. And if they did,
we should hardly be able to get up a solemn debate
in Convocation or Conference about the business.
We read that the Apostles and elders actually met,
v. 6, “ for to consider this matter ! ” There is no
hint given that the insolent objectors to the Gentile
brethren were reminded that their bigotry was a
rebellion against Christ’s great commandment of
love, nor that the sacrifice of his death had abolished
for ever, both for Jew and Gentile, the old carnal
ordinances. We are informed, v. 7that, “ when there
had been much disputing, Peter rose up and said unto
them, Men and brethren, ye know how that a good
�20
On Church Pedigrees.
while ago God made choice among us that the Gentiles
by my
should hear the word of the Gospel and
believe, &c.” He alludes to the miraculous conversion
of Cornelius, a divine lesson given in vain at least
ten years before. No pleader on either side is named
but Peter. His words seem addressed not to a pre
sumptuous and condemned minority, but to an
audience which all required to be convinced; and the
argument which he urges is not the notorious teaching
of Jesus and the Apostles about the nature of Chris
tian faith and brotherhood, but an appeal to the purely
Jewish experience of themselves and their fathers :
“ Now, therefore, why tempt ye God, to put a yoke
upon the neck of the disciples which neither our
fathers nor we were able to bear ? ”
Apostolic inspiration and infallibility appear to have
counted for little there ! This Jewish argument had
weight. Then all the multitude (not an abashed
minority) kept silence, and Paul and Barnabas were
heard; after which the president, James, summed up
and gave sentence.
The test of a correct hypothesis, either in history
or science, is, that it fits all the facts under observa
tion. The reader must judge for himself which of
these two hypotheses best fits the facts before us:
first, that the Apostles and elders, with the main
multitude of believers, were all sound along with
Paul and Barnabas in the faith of the reader’s special
orthodoxy, while the objecting party were a handful
of zealots in direct conflict with the heads and the
majority on the first foundations of Christian truth
and love; or, secondly, that the entire College of the
Apostles and the whole multitude of the Jerusalem
Church, excepting Paul and his few followers, and
Peter as a cowardly trimmer, were as arrant Jews as
they had ever been before the crucifixion of their
Lord, and intended to remain such, differing in
�On Church Pedigrees.
21
nothing of Mosaic ritual or Hebrew arrogance from
the rest of their countrymen, but bound together, as
a peculiar sect of Jews, by the simple confession that
Jesus was the Christ. As to the title Christian, that
belonged to the low Gentile party at Antioch ! It
will add a new interest to the theory of Creed-growth,
and to the perusal of the New Testament, if the
reader has a wish for further thought, to ponder the
relative value of these two hypotheses; and, by
patient, honest, meditation, he may, in time, enrich
himself with the priceless gems of truth, even if
neither hypothesis satisfies him.
The second hypothesis harmonises well with the
speech of James : “ Simeon hath declared how God,
at the first, did visit the Gentiles to take out of them a
people for his name ; and to this agree the words
of the prophets, as it is written, After this I will
return and will build again the tabernacle of David,
which is fallen down, and I will build again the ruins
thereof, and I will set it up, that the residue of men
might seek after the Lord, and all the Gentiles, upon
whom my name is called, saith the Lord, who doeth
all these things. Known unto God are all his works
from the beginning of the world. Wherefore my
sentence is, &c.” The well-known decree follows.
The above quotation from Amos ix. 11, 12, is thus
given in our authorised version correctly from the
Hebrew : “In that day will I raise up the tabernacle
of David that is fallen, and close up the breaches
thereof, and I will raise up his ruins, and I will build
it as in the days of old ; that they may possess the
remnant of Edom and of all the heathen which are
called by my name, saith the Lord of Hosts.” The
author of the Acts writing in Greek, or, at least, the
obliging editors, through whose transcribing fingers
and vigorous pokers our few ancient manuscripts
have come down to us, have given us the two verses
�22
On Church Pedigrees.
of the prophet nearly as they stand in the Greek of
the Septuagint, which has a less Jewish tone than the
Hebrew. It is very absurd to pretend that James
quoted at Jerusalem anything to his audience out of
their prophets in a foreign tongue, and in a version
so different in sense from the native Hebrew. Every
Jew there knew by heart those cherished Hebrew
words of Amos. From his infancy he had heard
them repeated with rapture by his mother and by the
aged members of his family, and, most of all, at the
moments in which his father or his brothers were
giving vent within the home circle to their rage at
the hated Roman. No word of the Old Testament
was more literally believed or more frequently recited
than this inspiring promise of the restoration and
extension of Hebrew dominion. It was a masterly
turn which James is described to have given to the
debate. The admission of the Gentiles into the fold
of the Church on easy terms of ritual observance is
made a preparation, not for the gradual abolition of
the Jewish law, a notion which Peter, perhaps, would
have countenanced, nor for the abatement of the
Hebrew claim of universal supremacy, but for the
final dominion over all the heathen, which was the
exulting faith and vision of every Jew, both in the
Church and out of it.
I know that I shall be censured for reading here a
tone of hateful pride and selfishness which the docu
ment before me does not utter. The document before
me ! Of all the pages in this book of Acts, this history
of the first infallible Council, this debate and decree of
assembled Apostles and elders, all, by the confession
of every sect and Church, speaking under the direct
inspiration of God, and competent to say, “ it seemed
good to the Holy Ghost and to us,”—this, I say, both
ought and must, if honest men had been the keepers
of it, have been handed down to us with scrupulous
�On Church Pedigrees.
23
and reverential care, every word and syllable as it
was first placed on record. But we have already
drawn attention to two undeniable proofs that it has
been tampered with, in the striking variation of the
Codex Bezse, and in the softened version of the pro
phecy of Amos. Now look at the words following
the quotation, v. 18 : “ Known unto God are all his
works from the foundation of the world.” This is
very true; but in its connexion here what is it but a
truism apropos of nothing? Would you be surprised
to learn, gentle reader, that this verse is a more
decisive evidence of that tampering than the two
preceding ones ? Griesbach has left yvwtrra a?r’
aiuvos doubtful, the first three words of the verse,
and has thrown the rest of it out of the text. Almost
any edition of the Greek Testament shows you this.
The importance of this little token lies in the obvious
remark that, while we know what the wise and pru
dent priests, the keepers of Holy Writ, have stuck
into, we do not know what they have left out of,
the primitive document. I hope my reader is not
wicked enough to say that these three evidences of
priestly handiwork, to speak nothing of arguments
still more convincing, drawn from the comparison of
the Acts with Paul’s Epistles, especially with the
Epistle to the Galatians, are sufficient to justify the
doubt to which so many of the learned have come,
whether Paul ever suffered himself to be dragged
before a Council at Jerusalem at all. Whether he
did or no, we have abundant proof that the fiction of
an infallible and unanimous Apostolate is without the
slightest historical foundation, and that our Church
pedigrees are contemptible rubbish, as they are
exhibited and expounded in all our schools of
theology.
We take another peep at the Acts of the Apostles.
In the twenty-first chapter we have an account of
�24
0/z Church Pedigrees.
Paul’s return to Jerusalem, after one of his great
missionary tours among the heathen, at a later period,
about sixty years, as the margin tells us, after the
birth of Jesus, or ten years after the first Council of
Jerusalem which has occupied us. At verse 17 we
read : “ And when we were come to Jerusalem the
brethren received us gladly. And the day following
Paul went in with us unto James ; and all the elders
were present. And when he had saluted them he
declared particularly what things God had wrought
among the Gentiles by his ministry. And when they
heard it they glorified God and said unto him, Thou
seest, brother, how many thousands of Jews there are
which believe ; and they are all zealous of the law :
and they are informed of thee that thou teachest all
the Jews which are among the Gentiles to forsake
Moses, saying that they ought not to circumcise their
children, neither to walk after the customs. What
is it, therefore ? the multitude must needs come
together : for they will hear that thou art come. Do
this, therefore, that we say to thee.”
There are thousands of us believing Jews, and we
are all zealous (or zealots) of the law ! No hint is given
of any shade of distinction as to Mosaic zeal and
observance, either between the believers and non
believers, or between the infallible Apostles and the
rest of the Church. There is no place here for a
section of fanatical Judaizers as distinct from the
better-informed believers ; where the question is, not
the obligation of the Gentiles to observe the law,
but that of Jews, all are unanimous: converted or
unconverted, Christian or non-Christian, they all
were alike zealots, nor does a single one come for
ward, of any rank or culture, high or low, inspired
or not inspired, to say a word for that wretched,
renegade, infidel Broad-Church man Paul! For
thirty years the infallible College had been teaching,
�On Church Pedigrees.
25
as we pedigree-makers are always pretending, our
Gospel, our special light, our Apostolic dogma, our
terrific unbloody sacrifice, and, above all, our grand
central doctrine of the “ one oblation of Christ
finished upon the Cross ” (Art. XXXI.), and how
“ this man, after he had offered one sacrifice for sins
for ever, sat down on the right hand of God, from
henceforth expecting till his enemies be made his
footstool; for by one offering he hath perfected for
ever them that are sanctified.” (Heb. x. 12.) For
thirty years the Apostles had been preaching this in
exact accordance with the Thirty-nine Articles, in the
full flavour of the infidel Westminster confession, and
of the gory strains of Watts and Wesley, with all
about Christ being gone up “ To sprinkle o’er the
flaming throne With his atoning blood : ” under this
preaching a generation had passed away, and babes
had grown up to the ripeness of manhood; and in
this Jerusalem were thousands of these Christian
men, who all their lives had heard nothing but
Bampton Lectures on Atonement and Papal allo
cutions about mass, with Calvinist railings and
Methodist slurs upon morality, legality, and formality,
from the lips of infallible Apostles; yet they were
all of them still arrogant, unmitigated Jews, circum
cising, ritualistic, sacrificing Jews, exactly as their
fathers had been before them ! Who were those
enemies whom He that offered the one sacrifice for
sins for ever, was expecting to be made his footstool ?
Those blood-sprinkling and atoning butchers of the
temple. Kone else but they conspired to shed his
blood, none else but they raised and sustained the
cry,—“ Not this man, but Barabbas ! ” And these
Apostles and primitive saints of Jerusalem, whose
names and effigies adorn the roots of all our Church
pedigrees, were, in the year 60 after Christ, still
fattening those very priests, and admiring those same
Pharisees !
�<16
On Church Pedigrees.
What say the commeniatoi’s to this testimony from
the lips of the Bishop of Jerusalem ? They are
simply dumbfoundered. I will not condescend to
quote a sentence of the hurried nonsense and con
tradiction with which they all wriggle away from it.
I have heard divines say boldly that though these
Apostolic Christians did observe the law of Moses in
many things, yet they never trod under foot the Son
of God, nor counted unholy the blood of the Gospel
covenant, by partaking in the sacrifices or accepting
the atonement of the temple-worship. One of them
once defied me to prove that the Apostles ever offered
sacrifice as Jews after the resurrection. I have for
gotten how he pretended to reply to what follows in
our quotation, at verse 23 of this 21st chapter: “ Do
therefore this that we say to thee ; we have four men
which have a vow on them; them take, and purify
thyself with them, and be at charges with them, that
they may shave their heads; and all may know that
those things whereof they are informed concerning
thee, are nothing; but that thou thyself walkest
orderly and keepest the law. . . Then Paul took the
men, and the next day purifying himself with them
entered into the temple, to signify the accomplish
ment of the days of purification, until that an offer
ing should be offered for every one of them.” The
Greek is v-irep evos eKaarov avrtHv, most literally for
every one of them,. It is first-rate theology here to
pretend that Paul is not affirmed to have partaken in
the temple rites and sacrifices both for himself and
the four who were purified along with him. The
offerings required by the law (Numb, vi.) were two
lambs and a ram for each person, besides other ex
penses, including burnt-offering, sin-offering, and
peace-offering. If the narrator had intended the
reader to understand that Paul simply bore the
cost of sacrifice and atonement for others in which
he did not partake himself, it would have been
�On Church Pedigrees.
27
very easy for him to say a word to indicate his
meaning. But at the time when the Acts were
compiled, it was so notorious to all men that the
Jerusalem Christians of the date were still temple
worshipping and sacrificing Jews, that it was vain to
attempt, nor is it likely that any one would attempt,
to disguise the fact. I leave the reader to form his
own judgment of Paul’s share and sanction of the
temple sacrifices.
On the morality of this transaction, in which Paul
is described as taking part in order to deceive the
•multitude, I shall say nothing. Honest Adam Clarke
tries to relieve his distressed feelings about it thus :
“ However we may consider the subject, it is exceed
ingly difficult to account for the conduct of James
and the elders, and of Paul, on this occasion. There
seems to have been something in this transaction
which we do not fully understand.”
You look in vain for traces of distinction in this
crowded narrative of Paul’s adventures at Jerusalem,
between the believing and non-believing Jews : all
are lost in one multitude. There is nothing of senti
ment or of action, either social or sectarian, to dis
tinguish the party of the Apostles from the crowd,
except the bare words, brethren and believers. The
belief in Jesus as the risen Christ who was speedily
returning appears to have been a purely speculative
matter, which introduced no evident breach of con
tact or continuity between Christian and non-Chris
tian Jews any more than while Jesus was living. All
alike resented the Broad Churchmanship of Paul, and
were furious at the notion that the Mosaic obligations,
pretensions, and hatreds were to be interfered with,
either at home or abroad, among the chosen seed.
High Church Jews the believers were, and High
Church they intended to remain, till Christ should
come again. Down with all Broad Churchmen, was
the universal cry.
�28
On Church Pedigrees.
I shall not enter here on the question, how far the
discords between the Acts and Paul’s Epistles throw
doubt upon the historical value of the former. No
words can exaggerate the importance of this inquiry.
If the reader desires to see the matter briefly and
lucidly handled, he will find all that he desires in
plain English, in The English Life of Jesus (Intro
duction), in this series. And when he has read it, it
will be an interesting occupation to run about inquir
ing of the Christian Evidence Society where he is to
find a confutation of that book, or which of them
intends to demolish that Introduction, and how soon.
�
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On church pedigrees
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Kirkman, Thomas Penyngton
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Thomas Scott
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Text
THE
PUBLISHED BY THOMAS SCOTT,
NO. 11, THE TERRACE, FARQUHAR ROAD,
UPPER NORWOOD, LONDON, S.E.
’
1 8 7 6.
'ice Sixpence.
��THE
CHURCH OF ENGLAND CATECHISM.
ISE men, in modern times, are striving earnestly
and zealously to, as far as possible, free religion
from the cramping and deadening effect of creeds and
formularies, in order that it may be able to expand
with the expanding thought of the day. Creeds are
like iron moulds, into which thought is poured; they
may be suitable enough to the day in which they are
framed; they may be fit enough to enshrine the phase
of thought which designed them; but they are
fatally unsuitable and unfit for the days long after
wards, and for the thought of the centuries which
succeed.
“No man putteth new wine into old
bottles, else the new wine doth burst the bottles, and
the wine is spilled, and the bottles will be marred;
but new wine must be put into new bottles.” The
new wine of nineteenth century thought is being
poured into the old bottles of fourth century creeds
and sixteenth century formulas, and the strong new
wine bursts the bottles, while the weak new wine
that cannot burst them ferments into vinegar in them,
and often becomes harmful and poisonous. Let the
new wine be poured into new bottles; let the new
thought mould its own expression; and then the old
bottles will be preserved unbroken as curious speci
mens of antiquity, instead of being smashed to pieces
because they get in the way of the world. Nothing
is more to be deprecated in a new and living movement
W
�4
The Church of England Catechism.
than the formulating into creeds of the thoughts that
inspire it, and the imposition of those creeds on those
who join it. The very utmost that can be done to
give coherency to a large movement is to put forward
a declaration of a few cardinal doctrines that do not
interfere with full liberty of divergent thought. Thus,
Rationalists might take as the declaration of their
central thought, that “ reason is supreme,” but they
would be destroying the future of Rationalism if they
formulated into a creed any of the conclusions to
which their own reason has led them at the present
time, for by so doing they would be stereotyping
nineteenth century thought for the restraint of
twentieth century thought, which will be larger, fuller,
more instructed than their own. Free Thinkers
may declare as their symbol the Right to Think, and
the Right to express thought, but should never claim
the declaration by others of any special form of Free
Thought, before acknowledging them as Free Thinkers.
Bodies of men who join together in a society for a
definite purpose may fairly formulate a creed to be
assented to by those who join them, but they must
ever remember that such creed will lose its force in
the time to come, and that while it adds strength and
point to their movement now, it also limits its useful
duration, if it is to be maintained as unalterable, for
as circumstances change different needs will arise, and
a fresh expression of the means to meet those needs
will become necessary. A wise society, in forming a
creed, will leave in the hands of its members full
power to revise it, to amend it, to alter it, so that the
living thought within the society may ever have free
scope. A creed must be the expression of living thought,
and be moulded by it, and not the skeleton of dead
thought, moulding the intellect of its heirs. The
strength of a society lies in the diversity, and not in
the uniformity, of the thought of its members, for
progress can only be made through heretical thought,
�The Church of England Catechism.
5
i.e., thought that is at variance with prevailing thought.
All Truth is new at some time or other, and the
fullest encouragement should therefore be given to
free and fearless expression, since by such expression
only is the promulgation of new truths possible. An
age of advancement is always an age of heresy; for
advancement comes from questioning, and questioning
springs from doubt, and hence progress and heresy
walk ever hand-in-hand, while an age of faith is also
an age of stagnation.
Every argument that can be brought against a
stereotyped creed for adults, tells with tenfold force
against a stereotyped catechism for children. If it is
evil to try and mould the thought of those whose
maturity ought to be able to protect them against
pressure from without, it is certainly far more evil to
mould the thought of those whose still unset reason
is ductile in the trainer’s hand. A catechism is a sort
of strait-waistcoat put upon children, preventing all
liberty of action, and while the child’s brain ought to
be cultured and developed, it ought never to be
trained to run in one special groove of thought.
Education should teach children how to think, but
should never tell them what to think. It should
sharpen and polish the instruments of thought, but
should not fix them into a machine made to cut out
one special shape of thought. It should send the
young out into the world keen-judging, clear-eyed,
thoughtful, eager, inquiring, but should not send them
out with answers cut-and-dried to every question, with
opinions ready made for them, and dogmas nailed into
their brains. Most churches have provided catechism
sawdust for the nourishment of the lambs of their
flock; Roman Catholics, Church of Englanders, Pres
byterians, they have all their juvenile moulds. The
Church of England catechism is, perhaps, the least in
jurious of all, because the Church of England is the
result of a compromise, and has the most offensive
�6
The Church of England Catechism.
parts of its dogmas cut out of the public formularies.
It wears some slight apron of fig-leaves in deference to
the effect produced by the eating of the tree of know
ledge. But still, the Church of England catechism is
bad enough, training the child to believe the most
impossible things before he is old enough to test their
impossibility. To the age which believes in Jack-andthe-bean-stalk, and the adventures of Cinderella, all
things are possible; whether it be Jonah in the
whale’s belly, or Tom Thumb in the stomach of the
red cow, all is gladly swallowed with implicit faith:
the children grow out of Tom Thumb, in the course of
nature, but they are not allowed to grow out of
Jonah.
When the baby is brought to the font to make
divers promises, of the making of which he is pro
foundly unconscious—however noisily he may at times
convey his utter disgust at the whole proceeding—
the godfathers and godmothers are directed to see
that the child is “ brought to the bishop to be con
firmed by him, so soon as he can say the creed, the
Lord’s Prayer, and the Ten Commandments, in the
vulgar tongue, and be further instructed in the
Church Catechism set forth for that purpose.” It is
scarcely necessary to say that these words—being in
the Prayer-Book—are not meant to be taken literally,
and that the bishop would be much astonished if all
the small children in the Sunday School who can
glibly repeat the required lesson, were to be brought
up to him for confirmation. As a matter of fact the
large majority of godfathers and godmothers do not
trouble themselves about seeing their godchildren
brought to confirmation at all, and the children are
sent up when they are about fifteen, at which period
most of them who are above the Sunday School going
grade, are rapidly “ crammed ” with the Catechism,
which they as rapidly forget when the day of confirma
tion is over.
�The Church of England Catechism.
The Christian name of the child, being given in
answer to the first. question of the Catechism, the
second enquiry proceeds : “ Who gave you this name?”
The child is taught to answer—“ My godfathers and
godmothers in my baptism; wherein I was made a
member of Christ, the child of God, and an inheritor
of the kingdom of heaven.” Thus, the first lesson
imprinted on the child’s memory is one of the most
objectionable of the dogmas of the Church, that of
baptismal regeneration. In baptism he is “made”
something; then he becomes something which he was
not before; according to the baptismal office, he is
given in baptism “that thing which by nature he
cannot have,” and being under the wrath of God, he is
delivered from that curse, and is received for God’s
“ own child by adoption ;” he is also “ incorporated”
into the “ holy Church,” and thus becomes “a member
of Christ,” being made a part of the body of which
Christ is the head; this being done, he is, of course,
an “ inheritor of the kingdom of heaven” through the
“ adoption.”
Thus the child is taught that, by nature, he is bad
and accursed by God; that so bad was he as an
infant, that his parents were obliged to wash away his
sins before God would love him. If he asks what
harm he had done that he should need cleansing, he
will be told that he inherits Adam’s sin ; if he asks
why he should be accursed for being born, and why,
born into God’s world at God’s will, he should not by
nature be God’s child, he will be told that God is
angry with the world, and that everyone has a bad
nature when they are born ; thus he learns his first
lesson of the unreality of religion; he is cursed for
Adam’s sin, which he had no share in, and forgiven
for his parent’s good deed, which he did not help in.
The whole thing is to him a play acted in his infancy
in which he was a puppet, in which God was angry
with him for what he had not done, and pleased with
�8
fhe Church of England Catechism.
him for what he did not say, and he consequently
feels that he has neither part nor lot in the whole
affair, and that the business is none of his; if he be
timid and superstitious, he will hand over his religion
to others, and trust to the priest to finish for him what
Adam and his parents began, shifting on to them all
a responsibility that he feels does not in reality belong
to him.
The unreality deepens in the next answer which is
put into his mouth— “ What did your godfathers and
godmothers then for you ? ” “ They did promise and
vow three things in my name : First, that I should
renounce the devil and all his works, the pomps and
vanities of this wicked world, and all the sinful lusts
of the flesh. Secondly, that I should believe all the
articles of the Christian Faith. And thirdly, that I
should keep God’s holy will and commandments, and
walk in the same all the days of my life.” Turning
to the Baptismal Service again, we find that the god
parents are asked, “ Dost thou, in the, name of this child,
renounce,” etc., and they answer severally, “I re
nounce them all,” “All this I steadfastly believe;”
and, asked if they will keep God’s holy will, they still
answer for the child, “ I will.” What binding force
can such promises as these have upon the conscience of
anyone when he grows up ? The promises were made
without his consent; why should he keep them 1 The
belief was vowed before he had examined it; why
should he profess it ? No promise made in another’s
name can be binding on him who has given no
authority for such use of his name, and the un
conscious baby, innocent of all knowledge of what is
being done, can never, in justice, be held liable for
breaking a contract in the making of which he had no
share. Bentham rightly and justly protests against
“ the implied—the necessarily implied—assumption,
that it is in the power of any person—not only with
the consent of the father or other guardian, but with-
�The Church of England Catechism.
9
out any such consent—to fasten upon a child at its
birth, and long before it is itself even capable of giv
ing consent to anything, with the concurrence of two
other persons, alike self-appointed, load it with a set
of obligations—obligations of a most terrific and
appalling character—obligations of the nature of oaths,
of which just so much and no more is rendered visible
as is sufficient to render them terrific—obligations to
which neither in quantity nor in quality are any
limits attempted to be or capable of being assigned.”
This obligation, laid upon the child in its uncon
sciousness, places it in a far worse position, should it
hereafter reject the Christian religion, than if such an
undertaking had not been entered into on its behalf.
It becomes an “ apostate,” and is considered to have
disgracefully broken its faith; it lies under legal dis
abilities which it would not otherwise incur, for heavy
statutes are levelled against those who, after having
“professed the Christian religion,” write or speak
against it. Thus in early infancy a chain is forged
round the child’s neck which fetters him throughout
life, and the unconsciousness of the baby is taken
advantage of to lay him under terrible penalties. In
English law a minor is protected because of his youth;
surely we need an ecclesiastical minority, before the
expiration of which no spiritual contracts entered
into should be enforceable. From the religious point
of view, apostacy is far more fatal than simple non
Christianity. Keble writes :
“ Vain thought, that shall not be at all !
Refuse me, or obey,
Our ears have heard the Almighty’s call,
We cannot be as they.”
Is it fair not to ask the child’s assent before making
his case worse than that of the heathen should he
hereafter reject the faith which his sponsors promise
he shall believe ?
B
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The Church of England Catechism.
Besides, how absurd is this promising for another ;
a child is taught not to break his baptismal vow, when
he has made no such vow at all ; how can the god
parents ensure that the child shall renounce the devil
and believe in Christianity, and obey God 1 It is
foolish enough to make a promise of that kind for
oneself, when’ changing circumstances may force us
into breaking it, but it is sheer madness to make such
a promise on behalf of somebody else. The promise
to “ believe all the Articles of the Christian Faith,”
cannot take effect until the judgment has grown ripe
enough to test, to accept, or to reject, and who then
can say for his brother, “ he shall believe.” Belief is
not a matter of will, it is a matter of evidence; if
evidence enough supports an assertion, we must
believe it, while if the evidence be insufficient we
must doubt it. Belief is neither a virtue nor a vice ;
it is simply the consequence of sufficient evidence.
Theological belief is demanded on insufficient evi
dence ; such belief is called, theologically, “ faith,”
but in ordinary matters it would be termed “ credu
lity.” First amongst the renouncings comes “the devil
and all his works.” Says Bentham:—“The Devil,
who or what is he, and how is it that he is renounced ?
The works of the Devil, what are they, and how is it
that they are renounced 1 Applied to the Devil, who
or whatever he is-—applied to the Devil’s works,
whatever they are—what sort of an operation is
renouncement or renunciation ?”
Pertinent questions, surely, and none of them answer
able. A Court of Law lately sat upon the Devil, and
could not find him ; how is the Christian to explain to
the child whom it is he has renounced in his infancy ?
“ And in the first place, the Devil himself—of whom so
decided and familiar a mention, as of one whom every
body knows, is -made.—Where lives he 1 Who is he ?
What is he ? The child itself, did it ever see him ? By
anyone, to whom for the purpose of the inquiry the child
�The Church of England Catechism.
11
has access, was he ever seen ? The child, has it ever
happened to it to have any dealings with him ? Is it
in any snch danger as that of having, at any time, to
his knowledge, any sort of dealings with him 1 If not,
then to what purpose is this renouncement ? and, once
more, what is it that is meant by it ? ”
But supposing there were a devil, and supposing he
had works, how could the child renounce him 1 The
devil is not in the child’s possession that he might
give him up as if he were an injurious toy. In days
gone by the phrase had a definite meaning; people
were supposed to be able to hold commerce with the
devil, to commune with familiar spirits, and summon
imps to do their bidding; to “ renounce the devil and
all his works ” was then a promise to have nothing to
do with witchcraft, sorcery, or magic; to regard the
devil as an enemy, and to take no advantage by his
help. All these beliefs have long since passed away
into “ The Old Curiosity Shop ” of Ecclesiastical Rub
bish, but children are still taught to repeat the old
phrases, to rattle the dry bones which life has left so
long. The “ pomps of this wicked world ” might be
renounced by Christians if they wanted to do so, but
they shew a strange obliviousness of their baptismal
vow. A reception at Court is as good an instance of
the renunciation of the vain pomp and glory of this
wicked world as we could wish to see, and when we
remember that the children who are taught the Cate
chism in their childhood are taught to aim at winning
these pomps in their youth and maturity, we learn to
appreciate the fact that spiritual things can only be
spiritually discerned. Would it not be well if the
Church would publish an “ Explanation of the
Catechism,” so that the children may know what they
have renounced ?
“Dost thou not think that thou art bound to
believe, and to do as they have promised for thee ? ”
“Yes, verily; and by God’s help so I will. And I
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heartily thank our heavenly Father, that he hath
called, me to this state of salvation, through Jesus
Christ our Saviour. And I pray unto God to give me
his grace, that I may continue in the same unto my
life’s end.” “ Bound to believe .... as they have
promised for thee ! ” In the name of common sense,
why ? What a marvellous claim for any set of people
to put forward, that they have the right to promise
what other people shall believe. And the child is
taught to answer to this preposterous question, “Yes,,
verily.” The Church does wisely in training children
to answer thus before they begin to think, as they
would certainly never admit so palpably unjust a claim
as that they were bound to believe or to do anything
simply because some other persons said that they
should. The hearty thanks due to God “ that he
hath called me to this state of salvation,” seem some
what premature, as well as unnecessary. God, having
made the child, is bound to put him in some “ state ”
where existence will not involve a curse to him; the
“ salvation ” is very doubtful, being dependent on a
variety of things in addition to baptism. Besides, it
is doubtful whether it is an advantage to be in a
“ state of salvation,” unless you get finally saved, some
Christian authors appearing to think that damnation
is the heavier if it is incurred after being put in the
state of salvation, so that, on the whole, it would pro
bably be less dangerous to be a heathen. The child
is then required to “rehearse the articles of his belief,”
and is taught to recite “the Apostles’ Creed,” i.e., a
creed with which the apostles had nothing in the
world to do. The act of belief ought surely to be an
intelligent one, and anyone who professes to believe
a thing ought to have .some idea of what the thing is.
What idea can a child have of conception by the Holy
Ghost and being born of the Virgin Mary, in both
which recondite mysteries he avows his belief ? Having
recited this, to him (as to everyone else), unintelligible
�The Church of England Catechism.
13
creed, he is asked, “ What dost thou chiefly learn in
these articles of thy belief! ” a most necessary ques
tion, since they can have conveyed no idea at all to
his little mind. He answers: “ First, I learn to
believe in God the Father, who hath made me and all
the world. Secondly, in God the Son, who hath
redeemed me and all mankind. Thirdly, in God the
Holy Ghost, who sanctifieth me and all the elect
people of God.” Curiously, the last two paragraphs
have no parallels in the creed itself; there is no word
there that the Son is God, nor that he redeemed the
child, nor that he redeemed all mankind; neither is
it said that the Holy Ghost is God, nor that he
sanctifies anyone at all. How is the child to believe
that God the Son redeemed all mankind, when he is
taught that only by baptism has he himself been
brought into “this state of salvation?” if all are re
deemed, why should he specially thank God that he
himself is called and saved ? if all are redeemed, what
is the meaning of the phrase that “ all the elect people
of God ” are sanctified by the Holy Ghost? Surely all
who are redeemed must also be sanctified, and should
not the two passages touch only the same people ?
Either the Holy Ghost should sanctify all mankind, or
Christ should redeem only the elect people of God.
A redeemed, but unsanctified, person would cause
confusion as to his proper place when he arrived in
the realms above ; St Peter would not know where to
send him to. Bentham caustically remarks : “ Here,
then, in this word, we have the name of a sort of
process, which the child is made to say is going on
within him; going on within him at all times—going
on within him at the very instant he is giving this
account of it. This process, then, what is it? Of
what feelings is it productive ? By what marks and
symptoms is he to know whether it really is or is not
going on within him, as he is forced to say it is?
How does he feel, now that the Holy Ghost is sancti-
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The Church of England Catechism.
fying him ? How is it that he would feel, if no such
operation were going on within him ? Too often does
it happen to him in some shape or other, to commit
sin; or something which he is told and required to
believe is sin: an event which cannot fail to be
frequently, not to say continually, taking place, if that
be true, which in the Liturgy we are all made so
decidedly to confess and assert,—viz., that we are all
—all of us without exception—so many ‘miserable
sinners.' In the schoolroom, doing what by this Cate
chism he is forced to do, saying what he is forced to
say, the child thus declares himself, notwithstanding,
a sanctified person. From thence going to church, he
confesses himself to be no better than ‘a miserable
sinner.' If he is not always this miserable sinner,
then why is he always forced to say he is 1 If he is
always this same miserable sinner, then this sanctifica
tion, be it what it may, which the Holy Ghost was at
the pains of bestowing upon him, what is he the
better for it
Besides, how can the child be taught
to believe in one God if he finds three different gods
all doing different things for him ? As clear a dis
tinction as possible is here made between the redeem
ing work of God the Son and the sanctifying work of
God the Holy Ghost, and if the child tries to realise
in any fashion that which he is taught to say he
believes, he must inevitably become a Tri-theist and
believe in the creator, the redeemer, the sanctifier, as
three different gods. The creed being settled, the
child is reminded: “You said that your godfathers
and godmothers did promise for you that you should
keep God’s commandments. Tell me how many there
be 1 Ans. Ten. Ques. Which be they 1 Ans. The
same which God spake in the twentieth chapter of
Exodus, saying, I am the Lord thy God, who
brought thee out of the land of Egypt, out of the
house of bondage. Thou shalt have none other gods
but me.” But God has not brought the child, noi’
�The Church of England Catechism.
15
the child’s ancestors, out of the land of Egypt, nor
out of the house of bondage : therefore the first com
mandment, which is made dependent on such outbringing, is not spoken to the child. The argument
runs: “ Seeing that I have done so much for thee,
thou shalt have no other God instead of me.” The
second commandment is rejected by general consent,
and it is almost certain that the child will be taught
that God has commanded that no likeness of anything
shall be made in a room with pictures on the walls.
Christians conveniently gloss over the fact that this
commandment forbids all sculpture, all painting, all
moulding, all engraving; they plead that it only
means that nothing shall be made for purposes of
worship, although the distinct words are : “Thou shalt
not make any likeness of anything." In order to
thoroughly understand the state of the child’s mind
who has learned that “ I the Lord thy God am a
jealous God, and visit the sins of the fathers upon the
children,” when he comes to read other parts of the
Bible, it will be well to put side by side with this
declaration, Ezekiel xviii. 19, 20: “ Yet say ye,
why ? doth not the son bear the iniquity of the
father ? When the, son hath done that which is law
ful and right, and hath kept all my statutes, and hath
done them, he shall surely live. The soul that
sinneth it shall die. The son shall not bear the
iniquity of the father.” The fourth commandment is
disregarded on all sides ; from the prince who has his
fish on the Sunday from the fishmonger down to the
costermonger who sells cockles in the street, all nominal
Christians forget and disobey this command; they keep
their servants at work, although they ought to “ do
no manner of work,” and drive in carriage, cab, and
omnibus as though God had not said that the cattle
also should be idle on the Sabbath day. Although
the New Testament is, on this point, in direct conflict
with the Old,—Paul commanding the Colossians not
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to trouble themselves about Sabbaths, yet Christians
read and teach this commandment, while in their
lives they carry out the injunction of Paul. To com
plete the demoralising effect of this fourth command
ment on the child, he is taught that “ in six days the
Lord made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that
in them is,” while, in his day-school, he is instructed
in exactly the opposite sense, and is told of the long
and countless ages of evolution through which the
world passed, and the marvellous creatures that
inhabited it before the coming of man. The fifth
commandment is also evil in its effect on the child’s
mind from that same fault of unreality which runs
throughout the teaching of the Established Church.
“ Honour thy father and thy mother that thy days may
be long in the land.” He will know perfectly well that
good children die as well as bad, and that, therefore,
there is no truth in the promise he recites. The rest
of the commandments enjoin simple moral duties, and
would be useful if taught without the preceding ones;
as it is, the unreality of the first five injures the force
of the later ones, and the good and bad, being mixed
up together, are not likely to be carefully dis
tinguished, and thus they lose all compelling moral
power.
The commandments recited, the child is asked—
“What dost thou chiefly learn by these command
ments ? ” and he answers that—“ I learn two things :
my duty towards God, and my duty towards my
neighbour.” We would urge here that man’s duty
to man should be the point most pressed upon the
young. Supposing that any “ duty to God ” were
possible—a question outside the present subject—it
is clear that the duty to man is the nearest, the most
obvious, the easiest to understand, and therefore the
first to be inculcated. Surely, it is only by discharge
of the immediate and the plain duty that any dis
charge becomes possible of one less near and less
�The Church of England Catechism.
plain. Besides, the duty to God taught in the Cate
chism is of so wide and engrossing a nature that to
discharge it fully would take up the whole time and
thoughts. For in answer to the question, “What is
thy duty towards God?” the child says :—“My duty
towards God is to believe in him, to fear him, and to
love him with all my heart, with all my mind, with
all my soul, and with all my strength; to worship
him, to give him thanks, to put my whole trust in
him, to call upon him, to honour his holy name and
his word, and to serve him truly all the days of my
life.” First, “to believe in him;” but how can the
child believe in him until evidence be offered! of his
existence? But to examine such evidence is beyond
the still-weak intellectual powers of the child, and
therefore belief in God is beyond him, for belief based
on authority is utterly valueless. Besides, it can
never be a “duty” to believe; if the evidence of a
fact be convincing, belief in that fact naturally fol
lows, and non-belief would be very stupid ; but the
word “duty” is out of place in connection with
belief. “To fear him : ” that the child will naturally
do, after learning that God was angry with him for
being born, and that another God, Jesus Christ, was
obliged to die to save him from the angry God. “To
love him; ” not so easy, under the circumstances, nor
is love compatible with fear; “ perfect love casteth
out fear ... he that feareth is not made perfect
in love.” “ With all my heart, with all my mind,
with all my soul, and with all my strength.” Four
different things the child is to love God with : What
does each mean ? How is heart to be distinguished
from mind, soul, and strength ? In human love, love
of the heart might, perhaps, be distinguished from
love of the mind, if by love of the heart alone a
purely physical passion were intended; but this
cannot explain any sort of love to God, to whom such
love would be clearly impossible. Once more, we say
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that the Church of England should publish an ex
planation of the Catechism, so that we may know
what we ought to do and believe for our soul’s health.
Bentham urges that to put the 11 whole trust ” in God
would prevent the child from putting “ any part of his
trust ” in second causes, and that disregard of these
would not be compatible with personal safety and
with the preservation of health and life; and that
further, as all these services are “unprofitable” to
God, they might “ with more profit be directed to the
service of those weak creatures, whose need of all the
service that can be rendered to them is at all times
so urgent and so abundant.” The duty to God being
thus acknowledged, there follows the duty to the
neighbour, for which there seems no room when the
love, trust, and service due to God have been fully
rendered “ Ques. What is thy duty toward thy
neighbour ? Ans. My duty towards my neighbour is
to love him as myself, and to do to all men as I would
they should do unto me. To love, honour, and suc
cour my father and mother. To honour and obey
the king, and all that are put in authority under him.
To submit myself to all my governors, teachers,
spiritual pastors and masters. To order myself lowly
and reverently to all my betters. To hurt nobody by
word or deed. To be true and just in all my dealings.
To bear no malice nor hatred in my heart. To keep
my hands from picking and stealing, and my tongue
from evil-speaking, lying, and slandering. To keep
my body in temperance, soberness, and chastity. Not
to covet nor desire other men’s goods; but to learn
and labour truly to get mine own living, and to do
my duty in that state of life unto which it shall please
God to call me.” The first phase reproduces the
morality which is as old as successful social life.
“ What word will serve as a rule for the whole life ? ”
asked one of Confucius. “Is not reciprocity such a
word?” answered the sage. “What thou dost not
�The Church of England Catechism.
19
desire done to thyself, do not to others. When you
are labouring for others, let it be with the same zeal
as if for yourself.” The second phrase is true and
right; the next is often foolish and impossible. Who
could honour such a king as George IV. ? while to
“obey” James II. would have been the destruction of
England. Honour and obedience to constituted autho
rities is a duty only when those authorities discharge
the duties that they are placed in power to execute;
the moment they fail in doing this, to honour and to
obey them is to become partners in their treason to the
nation. The doctrine of divine right was believed in
when the Catechism was written, and then the voice
of the king was a divine voice, and to resist him was
to resist God. The two following phrases breathe the
same cringing spirit, as though the main duty towards
one’s neighbour were to submit to him. Reverence to
any one better than one’s-self is an instinct, but “ my
betters’’ is simply a cant expression for those higher
in the social scale, and those have no right to any
lowlier ordering than the simple respect and courtesy
that every man should show towards every other.
This kind of teaching saps a child’s mental strength
and self-respect, and is fatal to his manliness
of character if it makes any impression upon him.
The remainder of the answer is thoroughly good and
wholesome, save the last few words about “ that state
of life unto which it shall please God to call me.” A
child should be taught that his “ state of life” depends
upon his own exertions, and not upon any “ calling ”
of God, and that if the state be unsatisfactory, it is
his duty to set diligently to work to mend it; not to
be content with it when bad, not to throw on God the
responsibility of having placed him there, but so to
labour with all hearty diligence as to make it worthy
of himself, honourable, respectable, and comfortable.
At this point the child is informed :—“Thou art not
able to do these things of thyself, nor to walk in the
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commandments of God, and to serve him, without his
special grace; which thou must learn at all times to
call for by diligent prayer.” But if the child cannot
do these things” without God’s “special grace," then
the responsibility of his not doing them must of neces
sity fall upon God; for the child cannot pray unless
God gives him grace; and without prayer he can’t get
special grace, and without special grace he can’t “ do
these things;” so that clearly the child is helpless
until God sends him his grace, and therefore the whole
responsibility lies upon God alone, and he can never
blame the child for not doing that which he himself
has prevented him from beginning. Diligent prayer
for special grace being thus wanted, the child is taught
to recite the Lord’s Prayer, in which grace is not
mentioned at all, and he is then asked—“ What desirest thou of God in this prayer?” “I desire my
Lord God, our Heavenly Father, who is the giver of
all goodness, to send his grace to me and to all people;
that we may worship him, serve him, and obey him,
as we ought to do.” We rub our eyes; not one word
of all this is discoverable in the Lord’s prayer! “Send
his grace to me and to all people ” ? not a syllable con
veying any such meaning: “ that we may worship him,
serve him, and obey him”? not the shadow of such a
request. Is it supposed to train a child in the habit
of truthfulness to make him recite as a religious lesson
what is utterly and thoroughly untrue ? “ And I pray
unto God that he will send us all things that be need
ful both for our souls and bodies, and that he will be
merciful unto us, and forgive us our sins.” “ All things
that be needful both for our souls and bodies ” is, we
presume, summed up in “ our daily bread.” Simple
people would scarcely imagine that “ daily bread ” was
all they wanted both for their souls and bodies; per
haps the souls want nothing, not being discoverable by
any real needs which they express. “ And that it will
please him to save and defend us in all dangers, ghostly
�‘The Church of England Catechism.
21
and bodily ; and that he will keep us from all sin and
wickedness, and from our ghostly enemy, and from
everlasting death.” Here, again, nothing in the prayer
can be translated into these phrases ; there is nothing
about saving and defending from all dangers, ghostly
and bodily, nor a syllable as to defence from our
ghostly enemy, by whom a child will probably under
stand a ghost in a white sheet, and will go to bed in
terror after saying the Catechism which thus recog
nises ghosts—nor from everlasting death. The prayer
is of the simplest, but the translation of it of the
hardest. “ And this I trust he will do of his mercy
and goodness, through our Lord Jesus Christ; And
therefore I say Amen, so be it.” Why should the
child trust God’s mercy and goodness to protect him?
There would be no dangers, ghostly and bodily, no
ghostly enemy, and no everlasting death, unless God
had invented them all, and the person who places us
in the midst of dangers is scarcely the one to whom
to turn for deliverance from them. Mercy and good
ness would not have surrounded us with such dangers;
mercy and goodness would not have encompassed us
with such foes; mercy and goodness would have
created beings whose glad lives would have been one
long hymn of praise to the creator, and would have
ever blessed him that he had called them into
existence.
The child is now to be led further into the Christian
mysteries, and is to be instructed in the doctrine of
the sacraments, curious double-natured things of
which we have to believe in what we don’t see, and
see that which we are not to believe in. “How many
sacraments hath Christ ordained in his Church ? ”
“ Two only, as generally necessary to salvation, that
is to say, Baptism and the Supper of the Lord.”
“ Generally necessary” ; the word “ generally” is ex
plained by commentators as “ universally,” so that
the phrase should run, “ universally necessary to sal-
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vation.” The theory of the Church being that all
are by nature the children of wrath, and that “ none,
are regenerate/’ except they be born of water and of
the Holy Ghost, it follows that baptism is universally
necessary to salvation ; and since Jesus has said
‘/Except ye eat the flesh of the Son of man and drink
his blood, ye have no life in you” (John vi. 53), it
equally follows that the Lord’s Supper is universally
necessary to salvation. Seeing that the vast majority
of mankind are not baptized Christians at all, and
that of baptized Christians the majority never eat the
Lord’s Supper, the heirs of salvation will be ex
tremely limited in number, and will not be incon
veniently crowded in the many mansions above.
“ What meanest thou by this word sacrament ? I
mean an outward and visible sign of an inward and
spiritual grace given unto us, ordained by Christ
himself, as a means whereby we receive the same, and
as a pledge to assure us thereof.” If this be a true
definition of a sacrament, no such thing as a sacra
ment can fairly be said to be in existence. What is
the inward and spiritual grace given unto the baby
in baptism ? If it be given, it must be seen in its
effects, or else it is a gift of nothing at all. A baby
after baptism is exactly the same as it was before;
cries as much, kicks as much, fidgets as much; clearly
it has received no inward and spiritual sanctifying
grace; it behaves as well or as badly as any unbap
tized baby, and is neither worse nor better than its
contemporaries. Manifestly the inward grace is
wanting, and therefore no true sacrament is here, for
a sacrament must have the grace as well as the sign.
The same thing may be said of the Lord’s Supper;
people do not seem any the better for it after its re
ception ; a hungry man is satisfied after his supper,
and so shows that he has really received something,
but the spirit suffers as much from the hunger of
envy and the thirst of bad temper after the Lord’s
�The Church of England Catechism.
23
Supper as it did before. But why should the grace
be “inward,” and why is the soul thought of as
inside, the body, instead of all through and over it ?
There are few convenient hollows inside where it can
dwell, but people speak as though man were an
empty box, and the soul might live in it. The sacra
ment is “ a means whereby we receive the same, and
a pledge to assure us thereof.” God’s grace then can
be conveyed in the vehicles of water, bread, and wine;
it must surely, then, be something material, else how
can material things transmit it ? And God becomes
dependent on man to decide for him on whom the
grace shall be bestowed. Two infants are born into
the world; one of them is brought to church and is
baptized ; God may give that child his grace : the
other is left without baptism ; it is a child of wrath,
and God may not bless it. Thus is God governed by
the neglect of a poor, and very likely drunken, nurse,
and the recipients of his grace are chosen for him at
the caprice or carelessness of men. Strange, too, that
Christians who received God’s grace need “ a pledge to
assure ” them that they have really got it; how curi
ous that the recipient should not know that so preci
ous a gift has been bestowed upon him until he has
also been given a little bit of bread and a tiny sip of
wine. It is as though a queen’s messenger put into
one’s hand a hundred <£1000 notes, and then said
solemnly : “ Here is a farthing as a pledge to assure
you that you have really received the notes.” Would
not the notes themselves be the best assurance that
we had received them, and would not the grace of
God consciously possessed be its own best proof that
God had given it to us ? “ How many parts are
there in a sacrament ? Two ; the outward visible
sign, and the inward spiritual grace.” This is simply
a repetition of the previous question and answer, and
is entirely unnecessary.
“ What is the outward
visible sign, or form, in baptism ? Water; wherein
�24
The Church of England Catechism.
the person is baptized in the name of the Father, and
of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost.” This answer raises
the interesting question as to wrhether English Chris
tians—save the Baptists—are really baptized. They
are not baptized “ in,” but only “ with ” water.
The rubric directs that the minister “ shall dip it in
the water discreetly and warily,” and that only where
“ the child is weak it shall suffice to pour water upon
it.” It appears possible that the salvation of nearly
all the English people is in peril, since their baptism
is imperfect. The formula of baptism reminds us of
a curious difference in the baptism of the apostles from
the baptism in the triune name of God ; although
Jesus had, . according to Matthew, solemnly com
manded them to baptize with this formula, we find,
from the Acts, that they utterly disregarded his in
junction, and baptized “in the name of Jesus Christ,”
instead of in the name of “Father, Son, and Holy
Ghost.” (See Acts ii. 38, viii. 16, x. 48, xix. 5, etc.)
The obvious conclusion to be drawn from this is, that
if the Acts be historical, Jesus never gave the com
mand put into his mouth in Matthew, but that it was
inserted later when such a formula became usual in
the Church. “ What is the inward and spiritual
grace ? A death unto sin, and a new birth unto
righteousness; for being by nature born in sin, and
the children of wrath, we are hereby made the chil
dren of grace.” What ? a baby die unto sin ? how
can it, when it is unconscious of sin, and therefore
cannot sin 1 “A new birth unto righteousness ? ” but
it is only just born, surely there can be no need that
it should be born over again so soon ? And if it be
true that this is the inward grace given, would it not
be well—as did many in the early Church—to put off
the ceremony of baptism until the last moment, so
that the dying man, being baptized, may die to all
the sins he has committed during life, and be born
again into spiritual babyhood, fit to go straight into
�The Church of England Catechism.
25
heaven ? It seems a needless cruelty to baptize
infants, and so deprive them of the chance of getting
rid of all their life sins in a lump later on. This is
not the only objection to baptism. Bentham power
fully urges what has often been pressed :—
“Note well the sort of story that is here told. The
Almighty God,—maker of all things, visible and 1 in
visible,’-—‘ of heaven and earth, and all that therein
is,’—makes, amongst other things, a child : and no
sooner has he made it, than he is ‘ wrath ’ with it for
being made. He determines accordingly to consign it
to a state of endless torture. Meantime comes some
body,—and pronouncing certain words, applies the
child to a quantity of water, or a quantity of water to
the child. Moved by these words, the all-wise Being
changes his design; and, though he is not so far
appeased as to give the child its pardon, vouchsafes
to it a chance,—no one can say what chance,—of
ultimate escape. And this is what the child gets by
being ‘ made ’—and we see in what way made—
‘ a child of grace.’ ”
“ What is required of persons to be baptised 1
Repentance, whereby they forsake sin; and Faith,
whereby they steadfastly believe the promises of God
made to them in that Sacrament. Why then are
infants baptised when by reason of their tender age
they cannot perform them ? [Why, indeed !] Be
cause they promise them both by their sureties, which
promise, when they come to age, themselves are bound
to perform.” Surely it would be better if these
things are “ required ” before baptism, to put off
baptism until repentance and faith become possible,
instead of going through it like a play, where people
act their parts and represent somebody else. For
suppose the child for whom repentance and faith are
promised does not, when he conies to full age, either
repent of his sins or believe God’s promises, what be
comes of the inward and spiritual grace ? It must
�26
The Church of England Catechism.
either have been given, or not have been given; if the
former, the unrepentant and unbelieving person has
got it on the faith of his sureties’ promises for him;
if the latter, God has not given the grace promised in
Holy Baptism, and his promises are therefore un
reliable in all cases.
“Why was the Sacrament of the Lord’s Supper
ordained 1 For the continual remembrance of the
sacrifice of the death of Christ, and of the benefits
which we receive thereby.” What very bad memories
Christians must have ! God has come down from
heaven on purpose to die for them, and they cannot
remember it without eating and drinking in memory
of it. The child is then taught that the outward part
in the Lord’s Supper is bread and wine, and that the
inward part is “ The Body and Blood of Christ,
which are verily and indeed taken and received by the
faithful in the Lord’s Supper,” the body and blood
nourishing the soul, as the bread and wine do the
body. If the body and blood convey as infinitesimal
an amount of nourishment to the soul as the small
portions of bread and wine do to the body, the soul
must suffer much from spiritual hunger. But how do
they nourish the soul ? The body and blood must be
somehow in the bread and wine, and how is it
managed that one part shall nourish the soul while
the rest goes to the body ? “verily and indeed taken
and received.” From the eager protestation one would
imagine that there must be some doubt about it, and
that there might be some question as to whether the
invisible and intangible thing were really and truly
taken. It needs but little insight to see how woefully
confusing it must be to an intelligent child to teach
him that bread and wine are only bread and wine one
minute and the next are Christ’s body and blood as
well, although none of his senses can distinguish the
smallest change in them. Such instruction will, if it
has any effect on his mind, incline him to take every
�The Church of England Catechism.
assertion on trust, without, and even contrary to,
reason and experiment; it lays the basis of all super
stition, by teaching belief in what is not susceptible
of proof.
“ What is required of them who come to the Lord’s
supper ? To examine themselves, whether they repent
them truly of their former sins, steadfastly purposing
to lead a new life; have a lively faith in God’s mercy
through Christ, with a thankful remembrance of his
death; and be in charity with all men.” It is the
custom in many churches now to have weekly, and in
some to have daily, communion; can the communi
cants who attend these steadfastly purpose to lead a
new life every time ? and how many “ former sins ”
are they as continually repenting of ? Here we find
the overstrained piety which throughout disfigures the
Prayer Book; people are moaning about their sins,
and crying over their falls, and resolving to mend
their ways, and vowing they will lead new lives, and
the next time one sees them they are once more pro
claiming themselves to be as miserable sinners as
ever. How weary the Holy Ghost must get of sancti
fying them.
Such is the Catechism that “ The curate of every
parish shall diligently upon Sundays and Holy Days,
after the second lesson at evening prayer, openly in
the Church ” teach to the children sent to him, and
which “ all fathers, mothers, masters, and dames shall
cause their children, servants, and apprentices (which
have not learned their Catechism) to come to the
Church at the time appointed,” in order to learn;
such is the nourishment provided by the Church for
her lambs; such is the teaching she offers to the
rising generation. Thus, before they are able to
think, she moulds the thinking-machine ; thus, before
they are able to judge, she biasses the judgment;
thus, from children puzzled and bewildered she hopes
to make men and women supple to her teaching, and
�28
The Church of England Catechism.
out of the Catechism she winds round the children’s
brains, she forges the chain of creeds which fetters the
intellect of the full-grown members of her com
munion.
TURNBULL & SPEARS, PRINTERS, EDINBURGH.
�
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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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Conway Hall Ethical Society
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The Church of England catechism
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Besant, Annie Wood
Description
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Place of publication: London
Collation: 28 p. ; 18 cm.
Notes: Printed by C.W. Reynell, Little Pulteney Street, London. Published anonymously. Author is Annie Besant. Attribution 'My Path to Atheism'. Printed by Turnbull and Spears, Edinburgh.
Publisher
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Thomas Scott
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1876
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CT189
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<img src="http://i.creativecommons.org/p/mark/1.0/88x31.png" alt="Public Domain Mark" /><br /><span>This work (The Church of England catechism), 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
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Text
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English
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Church of England
Catechisms
Church of England
Church of England-Controversial Literature
Conway Tracts