Apologia pro vita sua being a history of his religious opinions
Virgin, prayers for the dead, beautiful churches, munificent offerings
to them and in them, monastic houses, and many other observances and
institutions, which I used to say belonged to us as much as to Rome,
though Rome had appropriated them and boasted of them, by reason of our
having let them slip from us. The principle, on which all this turned,
is brought out in one of the Letters I published on occasion of Tract
90. "The age is moving," I said, "towards something; and most unhappily
the one religious communion among us, which has of late years been
practically in possession of this something, is the Church of Rome. She
alone, amid all the errors and evils of her practical system, has given
free scope to the feelings of awe, mystery, tenderness, reverence,
devotedness, and other feelings which may be especially called Catholic.
The question then is, whether we shall give them up to the Roman Church
or claim them for ourselves.... But if we do give them up, we must give
up the men who cherish them. We must consent either to give up the men,
or to admit their principles." With these feelings I frankly admit,
that, while I was working simply for the sake of the Anglican Church, I
did not at all mind, though I found myself laying down principles in its
defence, which went beyond that particular kind of defence which
high-and-dry men thought perfection, and even though I ended in framing
a kind of defence, which they might call a revolution, while I thought
it a restoration. Thus, for illustration, I might discourse upon the
"Communion of Saints" in such a manner, (though I do not recollect doing
so,) as might lead the way towards devotion to the Blessed Virgin and
the Saints on the one hand, and towards prayers for the dead on the
other. In a memorandum of the year 1844 or 1845, I thus speak on this
subject: "If the Church be not defended on establishment grounds, it
must be upon principles, which go far beyond their immediate object.
Sometimes I saw these further results, sometimes not. Though I saw them,
I sometimes did not say that I saw them:--so long as I thought they were
inconsistent, _not_ with our Church, but only with the existing
opinions, I was not unwilling to insinuate truths into our Church, which
I thought had a right to be there."
To so much I confess; but I do not confess, I simply deny that I ever
said any thing which secretly bore against the Church of England,
knowing it myself, in order that others might unwarily accept it. It was
indeed one of my great difficulties and causes of reserve, as time went
on, that I at length recognized in principles which I had honestly
preached as if Anglican, conclusions favourable to the cause of Rome. Of
course I did not like to confess this; and, when interrogated, was in
consequence in perplexity. The prime instance of this was the appeal to
Antiquity; St. Leo had overset, in my own judgment, its force as the
special argument for Anglicanism; yet I was committed to Antiquity,
together with the whole Anglican school; what then was I to say, when
acute minds urged this or that application of it against the _Via
Media_? it was impossible that, in such circumstances, any answer could
be given which was not unsatisfactory, or any behaviour adopted which
was not mysterious. Again, sometimes in what I wrote I went just as far
as I saw, and could as little say more, as I could see what is below the
horizon; and therefore, when asked as to the consequences of what I had
said, I had no answer to give. Again, sometimes when I was asked,
whether certain conclusions did not follow from a certain principle, I
might not be able to tell at the moment, especially if the matter were
complicated; and for this reason, if for no other, because there is
great difference between a conclusion in the abstract and a conclusion
in the concrete, and because a conclusion may be modified in fact by a
conclusion from some opposite principle. Or it might so happen that my
head got simply confused, by the very strength of the logic which was
administered to me, and thus I gave my sanction to conclusions which
really were not mine; and when the report of those conclusions came
round to me through others, I had to unsay them. And then again, perhaps
I did not like to see men scared or scandalized by unfeeling logical
inferences, which would not have troubled them to the day of their
death, had they not been forced to recognize them. And then I felt
altogether the force of the maxim of St. Ambrose, "Non in dialecticâ
complacuit Deo salvum facere populum suum;"--I had a great dislike of
paper logic. For myself, it was not logic that carried me on; as well
might one say that the quicksilver in the barometer changes the weather.
It is the concrete being that reasons; pass a number of years, and I
find my mind in a new place; how? the whole man moves; paper logic is
but the record of it. All the logic in the world would not have made me
move faster towards Rome than I did; as well might you say that I have
arrived at the end of my journey, because I see the village church
before me, as venture to assert that the miles, over which my soul had
to pass before it got to Rome, could be annihilated, even though I had
been in possession of some far clearer view than I then had, that Rome
was my ultimate destination. Great acts take time. At least this is what
I felt in my own case; and therefore to come to me with methods of logic
had in it the nature of a provocation, and, though I do not think I ever
showed it, made me somewhat indifferent how I met them, and perhaps led
me, as a means of relieving my impatience, to be mysterious or
irrelevant, or to give in because I could not meet them to my
satisfaction. And a greater trouble still than these logical mazes, was
the introduction of logic into every subject whatever, so far, that is,
as this was done. Before I was at Oriel, I recollect an acquaintance
saying to me that "the Oriel Common Room stank of Logic." One is not at
all pleased when poetry, or eloquence, or devotion, is considered as if
chiefly intended to feed syllogisms. Now, in saying all this, I am
saying nothing against the deep piety and earnestness which were
characteristics of this second phase of the Movement, in which I had
taken so prominent a part. What I have been observing is, that this
phase had a tendency to bewilder and to upset me; and, that, instead of
saying so, as I ought to have done, perhaps from a sort of laziness I
gave answers at random, which have led to my appearing close or
inconsistent.
I have turned up two letters of this period, which in a measure
illustrate what I have been saying. The first was written to the Bishop
of Oxford on occasion of Tract 90:
"March 20, 1841. No one can enter into my situation but myself. I see a
great many minds working in various directions and a variety of
principles with multiplied bearings; I act for the best. I sincerely
think that matters would not have gone better for the Church, had I
never written. And if I write I have a choice of difficulties. It is
easy for those who do not enter into those difficulties to say, 'He
ought to say this and not say that,' but things are wonderfully linked
together, and I cannot, or rather I would not be dishonest. When persons
too interrogate me, I am obliged in many cases to give an opinion, or I
seem to be underhand. Keeping silence looks like artifice. And I do not
like people to consult or respect me, from thinking differently of my
opinions from what I know them to be. And again (to use the proverb)
what is one man's food is another man's poison. All these things make my
situation very difficult. But that collision must at some time ensue
between members of the Church of opposite sentiments, I have long been
aware. The time and mode has been in the hand of Providence; I do not
mean to exclude my own great imperfections in bringing it about; yet I
still feel obliged to think the Tract necessary."
The second is taken from the notes of a letter which I sent to Dr. Pusey
in the next year:
"October 16, 1842. As to my being entirely with Ward, I do not know the
limits of my own opinions. If Ward says that this or that is a
development from what I have said, I cannot say Yes or No. It is
plausible, it _may_ be true. Of course the fact that the Roman Church
_has_ so developed and maintained, adds great weight to the antecedent
plausibility. I cannot assert that it is not true; but I cannot, with
that keen perception which some people have, appropriate it. It is a
nuisance to me to be _forced_ beyond what I can fairly accept."
* * * * *
There was another source of the perplexity with which at this time I was
encompassed, and of the reserve and mysteriousness, of which that
perplexity gained for me the credit. After Tract 90 the Protestant world
would not let me alone; they pursued me in the public journals to
Littlemore. Reports of all kinds were circulated about me. "Imprimis,
why did I go up to Littlemore at all? For no good purpose certainly; I
dared not tell why." Why, to be sure, it was hard that I should be
obliged to say to the Editors of newspapers that I went up there to say
my prayers; it was hard to have to tell the world in confidence, that I
had a certain doubt about the Anglican system, and could not at that
moment resolve it, or say what would come of it; it was hard to have to
confess that I had thought of giving up my Living a year or two before,
and that this was a first step to it. It was hard to have to plead,
that, for what I knew, my doubts would vanish, if the newspapers would
be so good as to give me time and let me alone. Who would ever dream of
making the world his confidant? yet I was considered insidious, sly,
dishonest, if I would not open my heart to the tender mercies of the
world. But they persisted: "What was I doing at Littlemore?" Doing
there! have I not retreated from you? have I not given up my position
and my place? am I alone, of Englishmen, not to have the privilege to go
where I will, no questions asked? am I alone to be followed about by
jealous prying eyes, which take note whether I go in at a back door or
at the front, and who the men are who happen to call on me in the
afternoon? Cowards! if I advanced one step, you would run away; it is
not you that I fear: "Di me terrent, et Jupiter hostis." It is because
the Bishops still go on charging against me, though I have quite given
up: it is that secret misgiving of heart which tells me that they do
well, for I have neither lot nor part with them: this it is which weighs
me down. I cannot walk into or out of my house, but curious eyes are
upon me. Why will you not let me die in peace? Wounded brutes creep into
some hole to die in, and no one grudges it them. Let me alone, I shall
not trouble you long. This was the keen feeling which pierced me, and, I
think, these are the very words in which I expressed it to myself. I
asked, in the words of a great motto, "Ubi lapsus? quid feci?" One day
when I entered my house, I found a flight of Under-graduates inside.
Heads of Houses, as mounted patrols, walked their horses round those
poor cottages. Doctors of Divinity dived into the hidden recesses of
that private tenement uninvited, and drew domestic conclusions from what
they saw there. I had thought that an Englishman's house was his castle;
but the newspapers thought otherwise, and at last the matter came before
my good Bishop. I insert his letter, and a portion of my reply to him:--
"April 12, 1842. So many of the charges against yourself and your
friends which I have seen in the public journals have been, within my
own knowledge, false and calumnious, that I am not apt to pay much
attention, to what is asserted with respect to you in the newspapers.