Rivington - Conversion of Cardinal Newman

8/2/2019 Rivington - Conversion of Cardinal Newman

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By CARDINAL NEWMANPrice 2s. 6d. net, cloth; wrapper, is. net.

LECTURES ON THEPOSITION OF CATHOLICS IN ENGLAND

With Introduction jjy theVery Rev. Canon Barky, D.D., and Portrait.The Nine Lectures can also be had separately, price One Penny each.

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Che Conversion of CnrMnal "Wewninn.BY THE KEV. DK. RIVINGTON.

On the 9th of October, 1845, the following letterwas posted by John Henry Newman to a numbetof his friends, having been written the day before"LiTTLEMORE, October 8, 1845. I am this night

expecting Father Dominic, the Passionist, who; fromhis youth, has been led to have distinct and directthoughts, first of the countries of the North, thenof England. After thirty years' (almost) waiting, hewas, without his own act, sent here. . . . He is asimple, holy man, and withal gifted" with remark-able powers. He does not know of my intention';but I mean to ask of him admission into the OneFold of Christ . . .

**P.S.This will not go till all is over. Ofcourse it requires no answer."

Speaking of that same year. Dean Church writes," It was not till the summer that the first drops ofthe storm began to fall. Then through the autumnand the next year, friends, whose names and formswere familiar in Oxford, one by one disappeared


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2 The Conversion of Cardinal Newman.and were lost to it. Fellowships, livings, curacies,intended careers, were given up. Mr. Ward went ;Mr. Capes, who had long followed Mr. Ward's line,and had spent his private means to build a churchnear Bridgwater, went also. Mr. Oakeley resignedMargaret Chapel [the forerunner of All Saints, Mar-garet Street, London] and went. Mr. Ambrose StJohn, Mr. Coffin, Mr. Dalgairns, Mr. Faber, Mr. T.Meyrick, Mr. Albany Christie, Mr. R. Simpson, ofOriel, were received [into the Church] in variousplaces and in various ways ; and in the next year,Mr. J. S. Northcote, Mr. J. B. Morris, Mr. G.Ryder, Mr. David Lewis. On the 3rd of October,1845, Mr. Newman requested the Provost of Orielto remove his name from the books of the Collegeand University, but without giving any reason.The 6th of October is the date of the ' Adver-tisement ' to the work which had occupied Mr.Newman through the year the Essay on the.Development of Christian Doctrine. On the 8thhe was, as he has told us in the Apologia receivedby Father Dominic, the Passionist. To the 'Ad-vertisement ' are subjoined the following words :

^'^ * Postscript.Since the above was written the Author hasjoined the Catholic Church. It was his intention and wish tohave carried his volume through the press before decidingfinally on this step. But when he got some way in theprinting, he recognized in himself a conviction of the truthof the conclusion, to which the discussion leads, so clearas to preclude further deliberation. Shortly afterwards circum-stances gave him the opportunity of acting on it, and he felt thathe had no warrant for refusing to act on it.' *

The Oxford Movement, by R. W. Church, Dean of St. Paul'si1891, p. 341.


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Tlu Conversum of Cardinal Newman. 3The same writer has said of the Oxford Move-

ment that ** Keble had given the inspiration, Froudehad given the impulse ; then Newman took up thework, and the impulse henceforward, and the direc-tion, were his."The letter of October 8, 1S45, contained the

judgement of its leader on the true goal of thatmovement It meant ** Rome." Mr. Gladstone,many years afterwards, speaking of Newman'srelation to "the religious mind of England," says," Of this thirty years ago he had the leadership ; anoffice and power from which none but himself couldeject him. It has been his extraordinary, perhapsunexampled case, at a critical period, Brst to give tothe religious thought of his time and country themost powerful impulse which for a long time ithas received from any individual ; and then to bethe main, though no doubt involuntary, cause ofdisorganizing it in a manner as remarkable, andbreaking up its forces into a multitude of notonly severed, but conflicting bands." -Of course we, as Catholics, believe that it wasAlmighty God Himself who removed John llcnryNewman from his position as leader of the greatreligious movement which began at Oxford, andwho placed him in the one fold of His EternalSon. The influence of that act of October, 1845,has by no means SF>ent itself; had Newman donenothing else but make that decision, he wouldhave mfluenced the religious thought of Englandas no other individual has in this century, the moreso as It has pleased God that we shoul


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4 The Conversion of Cardinal Newman.any other since St. Augustine wrote his Confessions.At Oxford Newman's influence was different fromthat of any other man, and to this hour his nameexerts a spell over English minds which is quitepeculiar. His sister wrote in 1841, "I am sure itis a great gift, that insight you show into humannature. When I think of people whom one callsdecidedly ' clever men,' I see what I estimate in youis not their sort of talent ; it is nothing intellectual,it is a sort of spiritual perception ; and I wonderwhether it is anything like the gifts in theCorinthian Church." ^ Principal Shairp has said," The influence he gained without apparently settinghimself to seek it, was something altogether unlikeanything else in our time. A mysterious venerationhad by degrees gathered round him till now it wasalmost as if some Ambrose or Augustine of olderages had reappeared. ... In Oriel Lane light-hearted undergraduates would drop their voicesand whisper, ' There's Newman.' When, headthrust forward and gaze fixed as though on somevision seen only by himself, with swift noiselessstep he glided by, awe fell on them for a moment,almost as if it had been some apparition that hadpassed." And of Newman's sermons, the samewriter observes, " Since then many voices of power-ful teachers may have been heard, but none thatever penetrated the soul like his."

It was in the heyday of his influence, when deepin the study of the Fathers, that the first shockcame, which ended, nearly six years after, in his

Letters and Correspondence oj J. H. Newman, vol. il (1891)Januarv, 1841.


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Thi Conversion of Cardinal Newman. 5conversion. The Church of England is not strongin history : she has produced no single Churchhbtorian of eminence in three hundred years. Shehas been passed in this respect, by German Pro-testantism, which has had at least a Neander.* Inthe year previous to that of which I speak Newmanhad answered a proposal to reform the RomanBreviary by saying, " I do not think it will do toattempt to correct it by history. None of theparties concerned are strong enough, in fact, to doa* It was Newman who really broke the ice.He plunged into the history of the fourth and fifthcenturies, by which the real character of the Churchmust ever be determined, embracing as they do theChurch's settlement of her doctrine on the Incarna-tion. He noticed in the history of the Eutychiancontroversy of the fifth century " the great powerof the Pope (as great as he claims now, almost),"and although he seemed to see also a "marvellousinterference of the civil power," he. was destinedsoon to discover that whilst the latter was not reallysubmitted to by the Church, the former fact was ofvital import in the controversy between Englandand Rome. This was in the year 1839, and thelight which found its way into his mind came notwhen he was ill at ease or already distrustful of hisposition, but in the course of his historical studies.The same year there appeared an article In theDublin Review in which the author (Cardinal Wise*

* Perfaap* one ought to name Milman's ImHh ChristianityFrom a Utermry point of view it is a book of great excellence,but it it M> tingeo with semi-Arianism that it cannot be placedOQ a level with even Neander.


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6 The Conversion of Cardinal Newman,man) showed that the mere fact that the Church ofEngland was out of communion with the rest ofthe Christian world, was its sufficient condemnation.She indeed judged the rest of the Church, butthe rest of the Church judged her. St. Augustinehad insisted on the principle, " the world judgesin security," as being fatal to the Donatists. Hecould point out that they had no letters of com-munion to the rest of the Episcopate ; the Christianworld did not recognize them. St. Optatus had ledthe attack, pointing to the fact that the Donatistsat Rome had no access to the chair and tomb ofthe Apostle Peter. St. Augustine added that roundthat See was gathered practically the whole world,and the Donatists were not in touch with thisworld. It was this that Cardinal Wiseman pressedhome the most.^ Newman felt the force of theargument. He said in plain English that the articlegave him " a stomach-ache." It was, he says, " thefirst real hit." " We are not," he says, " at thebottom of things." In the autumn of 1839, hetells Archdeacon Wilberforce that two things havedisturbed him(i) "the position of Leo in theMonophysite controversy," and (2) the principlesecurus judical orbis terrarum. used in the Donatistcontroversy. In other words, the history of theearly Councils revealed the fact that Rome hadsome right to the claim of antiquity, and the actual

' It has been said that the existence ot the Greeks in separa-tion from Rome alters the state of the question ; but the sameargument applies to those Easterns who are out of communionwith Rome. The Catholic and Roman world outnumbers allthe other Christians put together.


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The Conversion of Cardinal Newman. 7state of aflfairs before his eyes, viz., the isolation ofthe Church of England, could not be reconciledwith St Augustine's arguments as to the universalityof the Church, How could England be right, andthe rest of the Christian world wrong ? But inSeptember of this same year he wrote a sentencewhich forms the key to his real charactera resolvewhich carried with it the secret of his conversion :for two things are required for conversionthegrace of God and the correspondence of man.Newman expressed the latter when he said, Sei>-tember 22, 1839, "I will not blink the questionso be it.** He describes his mind in that year asbeing in presence of a "vista, opened, the end ofwhich I do not see " ; but he had determined not toblink the question."It must not, however, be supposed that Newman

was actually fearful, at this time, as to the claims ofthe Church of England on his allegiance. It wasmore the effect on others that he dreaded. Howcould he satisfy them and make clear the strengthof the Anglican claims, when in all honesty he mustadmit the Pafjal character of the Church in thefifth century, and when in all probability CardinalWiseman's article would infuse doubt into the minds


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8 The Conversion of Cardinal Newman.was dangerous ground to tread ; it was making actsof humility at the expense of what he called hismother. It also shirked the question, Was thecentre of unity Divinely appointed? If so, howcould our Lord have placed us in separation fromit, except that we might return to it by an act ofobedience ?

Another salve to be applied to the minds of thosewho might be disturbed in the Church of Englandwas to be found in the idea that "the CatholicChurch " had " not commanded their return at once "an imagination which would necessarily be dispelledby the reflection that the Catholic Church has receivedthe Bull Unam sanctani of Boniface VIII., and hasalways taught that there is no salvation out of theChurch.

But in the same year he strikes a keynote, thatwas destined to lead to much, when he says, "OurChurch is not one." It may seem strange that anyone should have supposed it was ; but, in fact, solong as the Church of England was fast asleep, ithad some appearance of unity. A heap of sandlooks at one with itself until it is moved by thewind or the spade ; movement is fatal to its unity.It was the same with the Church of England ; anymovement in religious matters was bound to makeclear its lack of real and living unity. It wouldreveal that there was no centre of gravity.The following year, 1840, witnessed the greatest

intellectual effort that had yet been made in defenceof the Church of England. It was a long andbrilliant article in the British Critic. Newmanspoke of it as " almost my last arrow." It was


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751^ Conversion of Cardinal Newman. 9intended to set at rest the minds of those whowere, or might be, disturbed by the Dublin Review.No one, I imagine, could read it at this distanceof time without feeh'ng its power, and withoutperceiving that it has served as an armoury fromwhich Anglicans have drawn most of their weapons,directly or indirectly, ever since.He maintains in that article that each diocese isa perfect independent Church, sufficient for itself;the essential communion of Christians lies in whatthey are, not in mutual intercourse, which is, ifobtained, a happy accident, not of the essence.This was the burden of Dr. Pusey's Eirenicontwenty-six years later. In this same article, New-man quotes, but misinterprets, St Cyprian, andadmits that St Augustine is against his interpreta-tion. He falls back on Gallicanism for support,but it is Gallicanism shorn of a vital principle,which was bound to bring its best members intoline with the Church, viz., the necessity of com-munion with the Pope, whether hncdiatcly orimmediately. In Newman's hands Gallicanism3rielded the theory that Catholicity, not the Pope,is of the essence of the Church ; the Church is,primarily and fundamentally, a united congrega-tion, a thesis which he thinks, strangely enough,cUspenses with the necessity of a visible head inthe person of the Pope. Then he suggests that StAi^[ustine appealed to the state of perfect inter-communion, because it existed in fact, but that itdoes not follow that it is an indispensable markforgetting that Augustine again and again insiststhat the absence of intercommunion is fatal to the


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The Conversion of Cardinal Newman. 1We are, as it were, proving cannon . . . one hasno right to a:isume that our Church will not standthe test" (2) The sympathy towards Rome, evi-dently created by his teaching, was also createdby Hooker and Taylor. (3) He might be destinedto ward off Rationalism by remaining at St Mary'sand " I am more certain that Protestantism leads toinfidelity than that my own views lead to Rome."He still harped on Meletius : " I think that thoughSt Austin is against us, yet that the case of Meletiusis certainly for us, and that our position is muchmore like the Antiochene than the Donatist." Hisanxiety in the matter was still mainly that he mightbe able to convince individuals that they were " notbound to leave the English Church." And heexhibits exactly that misapprehension which hasapfseared of late in so many Anglican writings asto the centre of unity. He says, "It is quite con-sistent to say that I think Rome the centre of unity,and yet not to say that she is infallible, when sheis by herself." Of course, if she is the divinelyappointed centre of unity, she cannot be by herself;the faithful must consist of those who are in unfonwith her.But all this time a stream of intercession had

been going on, of which we are reminded by anincident in the beginning of the year. In JanuaryNewman had met Father Spencer, the saintly con-vert who spent part of his life in inducing bishops,priests, and laymen all over the Continent to inter-cede for the conversion of England, and one ofwhose Order was destined to receive Newman intothe Church. The latter accuses himself of being


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12 The Conversion of Cardinal Newman,somewhat rude to Father Spencer when he methim at Oxford. Many a convert will understandthe meaning of this. It is difficult to be all oneM^ould wish to one who is praying for somethingabout which we think he has no business to praywith such assurance. But the prayers went on,and it is to these that Dr. Pusey, in a letter sincepublished, attributed Newman's conversion.The year 1841 was an important one for theChurch of England. In February, Tract XC.made its appearance. So much has been writtenon this subject, and the storm which it raised is sowell known, that it is only necessary to say herethat its object was not so much to satisfy New-man that he could himself remain where he was,as to satisfy others that they might do the same.The traditional interpretation of the Thirty-nineArticles had been, up to that time, on the wholedistinctly anti-Roman, in the sense that they wereheld to condemn the Sacrifice of the Mass, In-vocation of the Saints, and Masses for the Dead,whatever else they might permit or condemn.Here and there, rari nantes in gu7-gite vaslo, anAnglican divine had ventured on a timid sugges-tion that they might be held to condemn onlycertain abuses of these and other doctrines, andnot fhe doctrines as taught by the " Church ofRome" in general, or officially. Such an interpre-tation might be said to have been "implied in theteaching of Andrews or Beveridge"; but, as New-man observed, " it had never been publicly recog-nized." He made the trial. He claimed the riglitfor himself or his friends to hold that interpretation.


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Thi C(mversion of Cardinal Newman. 13He was already at Littlemore in the midst of quietstudy and prayer, taking charge of that dependanceof his Church of St. Mary, Oxford, when the stormburst For himself, although "not confident abouthis permanent adhesion to the Anglican creed," hewas at first "in no actual perplexity or trouble ofmind," even when denounced from end to end ofthe land. The episcopate, indeed, simply flung hismethod of interpretation out of the window ; butit did not trouble Newman ; he thought theepiscopal denunciations did not censure any onedoctrine. It does not seem to have occurred tohim that they were censuring Catholic doctrine allalong the line.

But something else did seriously trouble him. Inthe course of his reading in Church history anotherghost appeared. In the great Arian struggle he sawthe Church of England reflected in that third party,which condemned, indeed, the Arian impugner ofour Lord's Divinity, but stood aloof from Rome,whilst Rome represented the " extreme party " inher unbending orthodo.xy. In these semi-Arianshe saw the spirit of Anglicanism, the spirit ofcompromise and comprehensive toleration, at work ;and it was unequal to the task of preserving therevealed deposit Rome, he saw, is now what shewas then, and the truth lay not with the via media,which was the way of compromise, but with theextreme party, that is to say, with Rome.And now it was becoming evident that, as thebishops went on with their condemnations, theCatholic interpretation of the Thirty-Nine Articleswas in real jeopardy. And there was one funda-


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14 The Conversion of Cardinal Newman.mental difference between Newman and Pusey,which was bound to lead him further when thelatter might feel it possible to stay where he was.Newman, in his letter to the Bishop of Oxford onTract XC, says, "The Church is emphatically aliving body." Consequently, it could never sufficein the long run that he should be allowed to teachthis or that, when the Episcopate were teaching itscontradictory. A living Church must be a teachingChurch, and the teachers of the Church are herBishops. The fact that the Prayer-book containedstatements which could be said to enforce Catholicdoctrine would never make the Church of Englanda teacher of such doctrine, so long as her authorizedinterpreters declared against the orthodox teachingsupposed to be enforced in that Book of Prayernever, that is, supposing the Church to be "em-phatically a living body." It was in this thatPusey and Newman really differed at bottom ; itwas nothing to Pusey that the Episcopate wasagainst his interpretation of the documents of hisChurch, it was everything to Newman. He couldnot accept the position of representing the Churchin opposition to the Episcopate. It was not, tohis mind, a position consistent with the funda-mental virtue of the Christian life. And withoutrecognizing it, he was acting throughout the matterin accordance with the dictates of that virtue. Dr.Pusey recognized this in his friend, for he writes," They who have read what Newman has writtensince on the subject [viz.. Tract XC] must be wonby his touching humility." He was, indeed, as thewhole history of these five years shows, possessed


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1 6 The Conversion of Cardinal Newman.of Chronicles, viz., the peculiar attachment of theChurch in England to the Papacy, which preventedit from breaking with the Holy See when thatattachment was strained almost to bursting bydemands for support in the difficulties in whichPopes often found themselves in their strugglesfor the freedom of the Catholic Church. Ac-cordingly, Newman suggested to Mr. Bowden thepublication of a life of St. Anselm by way ofbolstering up an assertion of Laud's that Anselmwas his predecessor. It was with such championsof the faith as St. Anselm and St. Thomas a Becketthat Newman wished to be one, and his estimateof the so-called Reformers of the sixteenth centuryhad proportionately sunk. It was at this time thathe said of Dr. Pusey, " We differ historically."And, again, " I do fear that his historical view ofthe Reformation is his great bulwark against Romewhich is not a comfortable thought."

But Newman's idea of continuity was now des-tined to receive a rude shock. It was decided bythe authorities of the Church of England to con-secrate a bishop for Jerusalem. This was not reallya more schismatical proceeding than the con-secration of a bishop for Quebec ; but it broughtinto startling evidence the true genius of theEstablishment. " Our Church seems fast Pro-testantizing itself," he says. It was really onlyshowing itself what it had been from 1558 onwards.But the dream of continuity had blinded the Oxfordpeople to the facts of her history. There were inJerusalem " perhaps half a dozen converted Jews" we are sending a bishop to make a communion.


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20 The Conversion of Cardinal New?nan,ing that the Apostolical succession is a sufficientguarantee of sacramental grace, without union withthe Christian Church throughout the world." Itwas the exact position afterwards elaborated byDr. Pusey in his Eirenicon. Newman, as manyAnglican teachers since, compared the position ofthe Church of England to that of the ten tribesof Israel, who, he says, were " not in the Church,but had the means of grace and hope of accep-tance with their Maker." St. Cyprian denies thatthe Church can ever be thus divided, but hispassage alluding to the ten tribes seems to haveescaped both Newman and Pusey.One barrier, however, to Newman's submissionneeds special mention. He was, he says, "in a

serious state of doubt," but " I could not go toRome while I thought what I did of the devotionsshe sanctioned to the Blessed Virgin and theSaints." It is well for us Catholics to rememberthis fact when dealing with our non-Catholicfriendsto remember how deeply-rooted theirprejudices are on this particular subject Somecenturies of non-Catholic life have done theirwork. But in Newman's case the difficulty wasnow in part removed by something which hehad taken with him into his long retreat. Hehad met Dr. Russell, of Maynooth, at the end of1842, and of him he says that "he had more todo with my conversion than any one else." Hedid not speak on religion when they met, but hesent Newman some cheap tracts. These weredestined to enlighten him as to the true characterof Catholic devotion to our Lady and the Saints.


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The Conversion of Cardinal Newman. 21

And now it was that the genius of Newmanshowed itself. His standpoint had been antiquity ;he had sought for Rome in the primitive Churchand not found her. He had imagined that he hadseen something like the Church of England there.But it was the Church of England, not as he sawher before his eyes, but as he had idealized herin his hopes. Was she there at all? If not, wasRome there? It now occurred to him that inseeking for Rome in antiquity, he was seeking forher clothed in the accidents of her present position.Divest her of her accidents, and was she there inessence, in substance? VV^as not this all for whicha rational historian could look ? It was an in-spiration. The note of antiquity could not mean,in either case, that Rome or England were to befound in the primitive Church just as they areseen in the nineteenth century. Was it not asound principle that we should expect some kindof development ? What, then, are the' natural lawsof development, and is Rome, according to thoselaws, to be found in the primitive days? Thefurther he pursued the matter, the clearer it becamethat the Supremacy of the Holy See was there, inthe earliest days, in substance. It acted then as wemight expect it to act, and its action then was thenatural counterf>art, given the change of circum-stances, of its action now.He had begun his inquiry with saying of theRoman question, " I will not blink it" Now in thelife which he led of prayer and mortification, awayfrom the distractions of other work, he bent hiswhole self to the work before him. He was, in


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The Conversion of Cardinal Newman, 23humble, self-sacrificing, patient scholar, divine, his-torian, could say of himself in reference to his nearlycompleted work, " Since the above was written, theauthor has joined the Catholic Church.*

P.S. I subjoin what Cardinal Newman wrote inanswer to the plea of Anglicans that they feel thecficct of Sacraments in their hearts and lives, and thattherefore theirs must be true Sacraments. " You tellne," he says, "that you have the clear evidence ofthe influences of grace in your hearts, by its effectssensible at the moment or permanent in the event

Vou tell me of the peace, and joy, and strength. liich you have experienced in your own ordinances.

. . . Why should I deny to your memory what is sopleasant in mine ? Cannot I too look back on manyyears past, and many events, in which I myself ex-perienced what is now your confidence? . . . CanI wipe out from my memory, or wish to wipe out,'hose happy Sunday mornings, light or dark, yearifter year, when I celebrated your communion rite,in my own Church of St Mary's [Oxford] ; and in thepleasantness and joy of it heard nothing of the strifeof tongues which surrounded its walls ? . . . Oh,my dear brethren, my Anglican friends ! I easilygive you credit for what I have experienced myself. . . Yet what has tliis to do with the matter inhand ? . . . Whatever be the comfort or the strengthattendant upon the use of the national ordinances ofreligion, in the case of this or that person, a Catholicmay admit it without scruple, for it is no evidence tohim in behalf of those ordinances themselves. Itb the teaching of the Catholic Church from time


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NARRATIVES OF CONVERSIONw.v.-.. Volumes, Crown 8vo. Is. 6d. each, net.

THREE CONVERTSFather Thayer, A\i5s Trail, Mrs. Howitt.

A PROTESTANT CONVERTED BYHER BIBLE AND PRAYER BOOKSOME CONVERTS

FIRST SEKJES, contaiuiti/:Cardinal Hewman. !'y Canon William Hirn-, D.D.Cardinal Manning.

Bathurst. iiy the Kcv UorttAr]] \\ii!>crtorro Yiatorit. By C Kej;an Pa.il. \f.A.

Wliy I left the Cbarch of El^lani. 15>- Janes Hntlen, K-CS.G.How I Came Home. Hy I^dy llfrl


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Rivington - Conversion of Cardinal Newman

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