Doubtless it is "a great and important fact," and especially so to Protestants, as, owing to the circumstance that this "great step," in a Romeward direction, has not been decisively dealt with by the Heads of the Church, further steps have been taken.

This year, 1867, a volume of Essays on the Re-Union of Christendom,* by members of the Roman Catholic, Oriental, and Anglican Communions, with a Preface by Dr. Pusey has been published. In the Preface Dr. Pusey says, "the intellectual basis of a future union" between the Roman and Anglican Communions, is "that the Council of Trent might be legitimately explained, so that it could be received by Anglo-Catholics, and that our Articles contain nothing which is, in its grammatical sense, adverse to the council of Trent."†

One of the Essayists, a beneficed Clergyman, says "though Tract 90 was burked at its first birth in 1841, it has risen again from its ashes under the tender manipulation of Dr. Pusey." "Its second

birth has found the feeling of the Church of England more prepared for its acceptance; and it will now no doubt be a stand point, or vantage ground so to say, upon which ulterior measures will be taken in the same direction."

Another, also a beneficed Clergyman, speaking of an interview he had with the late Cardinal Wiseman, "shortly before his lamented death," when the question of Re-Union was discussed, says, "what joy the "Eirenicon"‡ would have given to the Cardinal in his last hours. How would it have sealed those strong convictions which he entertained as to the reality of the Catholic movement in the Church of England. How would it have afforded him a last evidence of the fruits of his own labours, in behalf of Catholic Re-Union in our land." "Here was that which the Cardinal had in principle anticipated years before, while in many of its details, the "Eirenicon" was the exact transcript of his own bright mind." Cardinal Wiseman at once saw in "Tract 90, a basis of accommodation between Anglicanism and Rome." "He suggested broadly that the decrees of the Council of

*See Page 57 for the Tractarian definition of Christendom.

+ One of the Essayists says "it is demonstrated in Tract 90, that such interpretation may be given of the most difficult Articles, as will strip them of all contradiction to the decrees of the Tridentine Synod."

See pages 65-66, for specimen of its teaching.

Trent should be made the rule of interpretation for the 39 Articles." "The Protestant world is under the idea that the 39 Articles are an insuperable barrier to any Re-Union with Rome." "We rejoice to know, on the contrary, that Cardinal Wiseman, Dr. Newman, and Dr. Pusey have openly declared the very opposite."*

Another Essayist, in this instance, a Roman-Catholic, says, "Assuredly no one will deny that ever since the year 1833, when the illustrious Newman, in conjunction with the learned Dr. Pusey, first commenced the publication of the celebrated 'Tracts for the Times,' a most remarkable movement towards Catholic principles has set in in the Anglican Church." "I myself, well remember, in the early part of the year 1834," I said, "These Tracts are the commencement of a movement, the end of which will be the Re-Union of the" Anglican Church "with the Mother Church" of Rome.

The following extracts will shew what some men mean by ReUnion; and, also, the steps necessary, in their opinion, to be taken to bring it about.

In 1841, one of the Tractarian party published an Article in the British Critic, on Bishop Jewel, from which the following extract is taken.

"It ought not to be for nothing;† no, nor for anything short of some very vital truth-some truth not to be rejected without Fatal ERROR, nor embraced without RADICAL CHANGE-that persons of name and influence should venture on the part of 'ecclesiastical agitators,' intrude upon the peace of the contented, and raise doubts in the minds of the uncomplaining, vex the Church with controversy, alarm serious men, and interrupt the established order of things, set 'the father against the son, and the mother against her daughter,' and

"The elaborate attempt" made in Tract 90, "to explain away the real meaning of the Articles," seems to have succeeded to a marvellous extent. p. 78.

+ In 1841, the late Dr. Arnold said, "How startling it is to see how quietly opposite opinions lie side by side, so long as neither are entertained keenly; but, when both become deep and real convictions, then toleration is no longer easy. I dreamt some years ago of a softening of the opposition between Roman Catholics and Protestants, having been beguiled by the apparent harmony subsisting between them, while the principles of both were slumbering. But I do not dream of it now; for the principles are eternally at variance, and now men are beginning to feel their principles, and act on them. I should not be surprised to see a time of persecution; and the histories of the old Martyrs, appear to me now things which we may ourselves be called upon to realize, for wherever men are not indifferent, I doubt greatly whether they are much advanced in charity.”—Arnold's Life and Correspondence, by Stanley, Fourth Edition, Vol. II, p. 306.

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lead the taught to say, 'I have more understanding than my teacher.' All this has been done; and all this is worth hazarding in a matter of life and death; much of it is predicted as the characteristic result, and therefore the sure criterion of the truth. An object thus momentous we believe to be the UNPROTESTANTIZING, to use an offensive but forcible word, of the National Church; and accordingly, we are ready to endure, however we may lament, the undeniable, and in themselves disastrous, effects of the pending controversy."

"WE CANNOT STAND WHERE WE ARE; we must go backwards or forwards; and it will surely be the latter. It is absolutely necessary towards the consistency of the system which certain parties are labouring to restore, that truths should be clearly stated which as yet have been but intimated, and others developed which are now but in germ. "As one among many instances of the way in which Catholic truths modify one another, might be mentioned the tendency of correct views of the sacramental efficacy of penance, and of the power of the keys, to adjust the doctrine of the Church concerning 'sin after baptism."" "It is worth considering, whether the opposition which the ancient religion encounters in our own age, be not in part owing to the necessity entailed by our circumstances, of restoring it by degrees." "AS WE GO ON WE MUST RECEDE MORE AND MORE FROM THE PRINCIPLES, IF ANY SUCH THERE BE, OF THE ENGLISH REFORMATION."

In 1867, one of the Essayists, a beneficed Clergyman, in the Diocese of Salisbury, takes for his subject, the difficulties of Re-Union: "The first hindrance," he says, "arises from the Protestantism of England. Till this is removed, the Re-Union of our Church, as the Church of England, with either the Greek or Latin Churches, is absolutely hopeless." "I do not say that England must merely be Un-Protestantized before this can be, but I say more, she must be Catholicized."* One, whose contribution to the first series of "The Church and the World" attracted much attention, says, in the first number of a series on "Our Principles and Position," entitled "Protestantism and the Prayer Book," "It seems probable that the advances made

* "Undoubtedly, I think worse of Roman Catholicism in itself, than I did some years ago. But my feelings towards [a Roman-Catholic] are quite different from my feelings towards [a Newmanite] because I think the one a fair enemy, the other a treacherous one. The one is the Frenchman in his own uniform and within his own præsidia; the other the Frenchman disguised in a red coat, and holding a post within our præsidia, for the purpose of betraying it. I should honour the first, and hang the second."-Arnold's Life, &c., Vol II. p. 289.

of late years in the outward and visible expression of Catholic Truth, are likely to bring the two contending parties, Protestants and Catholics, to a decisive severance."

"The Evangelicals of the present day, are beginning to perceive that they and we belong to two different religions,* and that the same Church cannot long hold us both."

In reply to an accusation "that Ritualism is a conspiracy to expel Protestantism from our Church, in name, in form, in doctrine,” the Writer, unshrinkingly avows that such is the aim and object of the Ritualistic party: and then goes on to say that "the Catholics and the Protestants do not mean the same thing when they speak of being members of the Church." "The Catholic is a member of that larger Visible Society, the Universal Church, and to its doctrines, decrees, and canons, he gives the first place in his allegiance." "In some things he may consider the Churches in other countries, truer to the Religion of undivided Christendom than his own [the Anglican:] but as he perceives her Orders and Sacraments connect him with the Gift of Pentecost, he remains contentedly in her communion, † always seeking to work for the restoration of her lost privileges, and the fuller enunciation of obscured doctrines."

*A Clergyman in the diocese of Worcester, in "Truths of the Catholic Religion," just published, says, "The Church of England may be divided into two great parties, maintaining and teaching doctrine entirely opposed the one to the other. Catholics date their origin from Christ, Protestants from the Sixteenth Century.' "Protestants think Preaching the chief thing in their Religion: Catholics, the most Blessed Sacrifice of the Altar, the Holy Communion of the Body and Blood of Christ."

He says of himself, "Oh, I love these good old Paths of Catholic Truth:" and under the heading of "The Superiority of a Catholic to a Dissenter:"

"Better is

it to be the meanest servant in the House of God, than the most popular rebel in the Synagogue of Satan."

+ The Hon. and Rev. Robert Liddell, of St. Paul's, Knightsbridge, expresses a similar opinion in a sermon just published. He says, "We have various local Churches in the East, and also in the West,-differing we must admit in some of their doctrines, yet all receiving Scripture as the Word of God,-all holding the same Ancient Creed, all claiming an Apostolical Succession for the Authority of their Ministries, and all holding the same Sacraments as the bonds of Union with their one Lord. Now it is not a matter of speculation, but a matter of fact, that to that local branch of the Church Catholic, entitled from our own country the Church of England, we, my brethren, owe under God our Spiritual life. She is our Mother, because she bore us to God in the Sacrament of our Regeneration and new Birth, and she has nurtured and fed us from the time of our birth until now. We did not choose her, but the Providence of God ordained our spiritual as well as our natural birth, to be what it has been; so then, as children, we owe to this Mother, dutifulness and loyalty,-not because she is necessarily the best, but because SHE IS Our MOTHER." "Many people talk of being joined to the Communion of the Church of England, because she is the best, the purest, the most Scriptural Communion." Mr. Liddell goes on to say, that he is not prepared to affirm this

This Writer asserts "that as soon as the question is fairly grappled with, all parties alike find that 'Sacramentalism and Sacerdotalism,' are the fundamental principles of the Church of England." And, then, in accordance with the declaration of Dr. Pusey, that, "while that precious jewel, the Prayer Book, remains unaltered, Tractarianism cannot be destroyed or weakened:" maintains that "it is the Prayer Book that really hinders the Bishops from suppressing the Catholic Revival; and that, not from this or that sentence in it, but from its whole spirit and its whole tenor. The Church of England acknowledges all those to be children of God who are baptized. She teaches them their Catechism as such, and she lays them, and them only, to rest at the end as such, and nowhere hints at any other way in which men can become the sons of God. Her principle is clear enough; but it strikes at the root of Protestantism. Protestant doctrine is not that of the Church of England."

Assuming that the "Catholic" is the doctrine of the Established Church, and that "Catholics" are faithful Churchmen, this Writer very quietly says, "Do we then mean that all Protestants should at once quit the English Church and take refuge in dissent?" "By no means," is the reply, "so long as they honestly feel that they do intend to believe her doctrines, and will try to carry out all her directions, as well as circumstances will allow, without considering their own fancies." But "if the idea once crosses their minds, that there is indeed a body of Sacramental and Sacerdotal teaching in the English Formularies, with which they have nothing in common, let them acknowledge it at once, and openly, like honest men. himself, but still will venture to teach his flock that they "owe loyalty to their Church, because she is still their Mother in God; and admitted defects in discipline, or even doctrine, do not, cannot, nullify the fact of their filial relation to her." “The Church of our Baptism is our spiritual Mother, be she better or be she

worse.

How upon these principles the Reformation can be justified and maintained, it is difficult to see. If it be the duty, (a duty according to Mr. Liddell prescribed by the fifth commandment of the Decalogue,) of all men to remain in the Church in which they were baptized, the Reformers sinned in leaving the Church of Rome, and the Reformation was a sinful act. The Papal Roman Church was once the Established Church in this Country;-according to Mr. Liddell's theory, the Mother of all Christians in this country. If she were the Mother then, could she cease to be the Mother because some men left her, repudiated her claims, and denied her right to the title of Mother? Rogers was burnt because he denied her the name of Mother. (p. 59.) Was he right or wrong? According to Mr. Liddell, wrong, -but if so, why does not Mr. Liddell go to his Mother? The lapse of three hundred years can neither turn wrong into right, nor change the character of sin. If she were the Mother once, she must be the Mother still. If separation were a sin, it must be sinful to remain in a state of separation.