the doctrines of the Trinity and Incarnation! We reject with abhorrence this foul calumny on the word of God, and on the understanding which he has given to man. But let us quote the Tract; and let our readers judge of the honesty of those who, holding such notions, affect to claim Bishop Hall as on their side.

"It has been already said that our arguments must also keep clear, as much as possible, of the subjects more especially sacred. This is our privilege in these latter days, if we understand it, that with all that is painful in our controversies, we are spared that distressing necessity laid upon the early Church, of discussing questions relative to the Divine nature. The doctrines of the Trinity and Incarnation, form a most distressing subject of discussion, for two reasons; first, as involving the direct contemplation of heavenly things, when one should wish to bow the head and be silent; next, as leading to arguments about things possible and impossible with God, that is (practically) to A RATIONALISTIC LINE OF THOUGHT. How He is three and yet one, how He could become man, what were the peculiarities of that union, how He could be every where as God, yet locally present as man, in what sense God could be said to suffer, die, and rise again, all these questions were endured as a burden by the early Christians for our sakes, who come after; and with the benefit of their victories over error, as if we had borne the burden and heat of the day, it were perverse indeed in us, to plunge into needless discussions of the same character. This consideration will lead us to put into the back ground the controversy about the Holy Eucharist, which is almost certain to lead to profane and rationalistic thoughts in the minds of the many, and cannot well be discussed in words at all, without the sacritice of 'godly fear,' while it is well nigh anticipated by the ancient statements, and the determinations of the Church concerning the Incarnation. It is true that learned men, such as Stillingfleet, have drawn lines of distinction between the doctrine of Transubstantiation, and that high mystery; but the question is, whether they are so level to the intelligence of the many, as to secure the Anglican disputant from fostering irreverence, whether in himself or his hearers, if he ventures on such an argument. If Transubstantiation must be opposed, it is in another way; by showing, as well may be done, and as Stillingfleet himself has done, that, in matter of fact, it was not the doctrine of the early Church, but an innovation at such or such a time; a line of discussion which requires learning both to receive and to appreciate.

66

Nothing can be pointed out in the English Church which is not true as far as it goes; and even when it opposes Rome, with a truly Apostolic toleration, it utters no ban or condemnation against its adherents. On the other hand, the omissions, such as they are, or rather obscurities of Anglican doctrine, may be supplied for the most part by each of us for himself, and thus do not interfere with the perfect development of the Christian temper in the hearts of individuals, which is the charge fairly adducible against Romanism. Such, for instance, is the phraseology used in speaking of the Holy Eucharist, which, though on the whole protected safe through a dangerous time by the cautious Ridley, yet in one or two places was clouded by the interpolations of Bucer, through an anxiety to unite all the reformed Churches under episcopal government against Rome.'

"

"We have indeed too often fought the Romanists on wrong grounds, and given up to them the high principles maintained by the early Church. We have tacitly yielded the major premise of our opponents' argument, when we should have denied the fact expressed in the minor. For instance: they have maintained that Transubstantiation was an Apostolical doctrine, as having been ever taught every where in the Church. We, instead of denying this fact as regards Transubstantiation, have acted as if it mattered very little whether it were true or not, (whereas the principle is most true and valuable,) and have proceeded to oppose Transubstantiation on supposed grounds of reason. Again, we have argued for the sole Canonicity of the Bible to the exclusion of Tradition, not on the ground that the Fathers so held it, (which would be an irrefragable argument), but on some supposed internal witness of Scripture to the fact, or some abstract and antecedent reasons against the Canonicity of unwritten teaching. Once more, we have urged the unscripturalness of image worship as its only condemnation; a mode of argument, which I am very far indeed from pronouncing untenable, but which opens the door to a multitude of refined distinctions and pleas; whereas the way lay clear before us to appeal to history, to appeal to the usage of the early Church Catholic, to review the circumstances of the introduction of image

worship, the Iconoclast controversy, the Council of Frankfort, and the late reception of the corruption in the west.

There is, to our minds, something like effrontery, if it be not infatuation, in writing thus, and pretending that such divines as Bishop Hall held the same opinions. It is of a piece with claiming Bishop Pearson as an auxiliary in regard to the effects and results of baptism, notwithstanding he writes, All sins committed by any person after baptism are remissible; and the person committing those sins shall receive forgiveness upon true repentance, at any time, according to the Gospel;" (Pearson on the Creed; article Forgiveness of Sins,) whereas the Oxford Tract writers know of no such forgiveness, and condemn their miserable disciples to wear evermore "doubt's galling chain."

DR. HOOK AND DR. NOLAN ON THE TENDENCY OF OXFORD TRACT DOCTRINE, AS RESPECTS POPERY.

For the Christian Observer.

WE had just sent to press the preceding paper, when we read a report of the Rev. Dr. Hook's speech at a recent meeting at Bradford in aid of the Society for the propagation of the Gospel, in which he made the two following statements:-"By those who desire successfully to combat Romanism, not by returning railing for railing, but by argument, recourse is always had to the writings of those divines who are called high-churchmen. No high-churchman has been perverted to Romanism." The matter is so connected with the subject of our last paper, that we will offer a few remarks upon it.

Dr. Hook is misinformed as to both the above particulars. The statement that those who desire successfully to combat Romanism by argument, not raillery, always have recourse to the writings of the divines alluded to, does not convey a fact. The persons intended by the expression High-churchmen, are of course those who adopt the opinions advocated by Dr. Hook himself; and who oppose what they consider to be Romanism (for much is Romanistic that they do not consider so) upon the grounds set forth in his speech. He says that the father of a young man came to him, lamenting that his son had determined to go over to Popery, and requesting him to converse with him. Upon his doing so, the youth said: "My father tells me that I am to go for my religion to the Bible only. He there finds Trinitarian doctrine; I find only that of Arianism; what then am I to do?' Upon which Dr. Hook replies, "We of the [high] church should immediately answer, Bend your own conjectures to the interpretation put upon Scripture by the church universal, the catholic. church; here is an umpire." Again, he says, respecting Transubstantiation, that "there is a seeming authority [in Scripture] for what the Romanists say of Transubstantiation;" therefore, adds he, "those who hold [high] church principles take a surer and safer course;"—that is, than that of appealing to Scripture, or of showing the absurdity, and even the physical impossibility, of the doctrine, as the reformers did, and as every writer not assuming to be "high-church" has done. And what is this "surer and safer course?" What is surer and

CHRIST. OBSERV. No. 23.

4 P

safer than the word of God? Or what can be more clear and convincing than the argument used by the Church of England in the postscript to the communion-office, but which is accounted by the Oxford Tract divines a rationalistic and infidel appeal to commonsense; namely, that "the natural body and blood of our Saviour Christ are in heaven, and not here; it being against the truth of Christ's natural body to be at one time in more places than one.” This is a just appeal to the faculties of reason and understanding with which God has endued us, and which no Scriptural doctrine— certainly not that of the Trinity-contradicts. The Church of England appeals also to Scripture; as for instance in the twentyeighth Article, where we read: "Transubstantiation-or the change of the substance of bread and wine in the Supper of the Lord-cannot be proved by Holy Writ; but is repugnant to the plain words of Scripture;" whereas Dr. Hook asserts that so far from the notion being "repugnant to the plain words of Scripture," it has "a seeming authority" from them; so that primâ facie the Papist is right; and therefore to urge Scripture, or to make use of the faculties with which God has endued us in a matter upon which reason itself may determine, as whether “a natural body can be at one time in more places than one," Dr. Hook considers neither sure nor safe. He therefore proceeds as follows: "Those who hold [high] church principles take a surer and safer course; they say to the Romanist, Tradition is against you, and for us; certainly there is something to be said for a literal interpretation, [of Scripture in favour of Transubstantiation] but there is more to be said against it;" that is, Tradition does not warrant it. "It is thus," adds Dr. Hook, that high-churchmen "oppose the Romanists with Tradition." Truly it is thus, and grievous work do they make of it; for though it is certain that Transubstantiation may be proved to be of comparatively late date, and we are far from resigning this accessory argument, which our Reformers employed with great learning and ability; yet the Romanist, in reply, affirms that the Fathers are on his side-and certainly the language of some of them respecting sacramental efficacy is far from being Scriptural, and often partakes of their old heathen superstitious feelingsso that long, arduous, and at best unsatisfactory, is such a combat ; and once yield to the Romanist that you are willing to place the question upon this issue, though you have the better cause, you may happen to be worsted by a more skilful adversary; and what is worse, you have adopted a fundamental distinctive tenet of Popery in opposing Popery; you have acknowledged as authority what every Protestant rejects; thus building your faith upon the word of man, instead of that of God.

But to return to Dr. Hook. If by the appellation "high-churchmen," be meant churchmen of the sect of Archbishop Laud, those who approve of it are welcome to it; but if it mean true, sound, scriptural, Anglican churchmen, it is not justly assumed by Dr. Hook: who-by the way-most improperly and invidiously took advantage of a meeting in aid of the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel, to broach and defend the doctrines urged in the Oxford Tracts; affecting to connect this venerable Society with them, and justly offending those who, having assembled for an object of Christian charity dear to all faithful members of the church, were constrained to listen to the peculiar dogmas of a sect, and either by their silence to seem to coun

tenance them, or to convert a peaceful brotherly meeting into a field of battle; a proceeding which it was the duty of the chairman to have prevented, by requesting Dr. Hook to keep to the business of the day, and not to sow strife among brethren.

We have affirmed that Dr. Hook has not stated what is correct when he says that those who desire successfully to combat Romanism always have recourse to the class of writings which he refers to. Does he then really suppose that those who refuse to make Tradition an authoritative "umpire" between them and the church of Rome, are hypocrites, and have no real desire "successfully to combat Romanism?" Does he suppose that our own reformers, with the great body of foreign reformers, and the great mass of Churchmen and Dissenters who have combatted Romanism with the word of God as their "umpire," had no wish to be "successful?" Does he think that Burnet, Stillingfleet, and Tillotson were not as determined foes to Popery, as Laud or the Non-jurors? Are the Homilies of the Church of England less honest than the Oxford Tracts? But then comes in the saving clause, "not by returning railing for railing, but by argument;" which certainly reconciles Dr. Hook's statement with fact, if only we make the concessions, that those who do not combat Popery in the manner of the Oxford Tracts, are but railers, and that there is no argument in their writings. But these concessions he must excuse us from making.

As for Dr. Hook's second statement, that "no high-churchman has been perverted to Romanism," it is so notoriously unfounded that it requires no reply. The most conspicuous convert to Romanism of late years in England is the Hon. G. Spencer, and he was led to it directly through the path which Dr. Hook asserts was never trodden in the way thither. He is known to have repeatedly declared, that from what Dr. Hook calls high-church divines he learned so much that he found he needed to learn more; and most especially in regard to the questions of Tradition and the Sacraments; and thus he was led from these high-church views in the Anglican pale, to what he now considers to be true church views in that of Rome. We will corroborate our statement by a passage from the Rev. Dr. Nolan's treatise just published, entitled " The Catholic Character of Christianity, as recognised by the Reformed Church in opposition to the corrupt Traditions of the Church of Rome." This learned and able writer, who has had the signal honour of being successively appointed to preach the Boyle, the Warburton, and the Bampton Lectures, deals rather unceremoniously with the Oxford "Tracts for the Times;" declaring that "it has rarely fallen to his lot to see so much inefficiency displayed in so narrow a compass;" and that "they are silly in argument, shallow in research, and pernicious in tendency." He adds:

"They do not appear to claim any merit on the score of novelty.___ With the whole of their views and reasons, I have been, indeed, long familiar. The writers from whom they are borrowed, without alteration or improvement, were recommended to my notice by a very worthy, well-intentioned person, not long subsequently to my entrance into the ministry. But I imbibed no share of his predilections for the views or purposes of the school founded by Archbishop Laud, of which he appeared so much enamoured. I could perceive no benefit, but much detriment, likely to arise to the interests of Christianity from their establishment; and the methods of proof by which they were enforced were shallow and illusory. They generally consisted of verbal sophisms, the equivocal senses of which, as lying on the surface, were easily penetrated; and which, when seen through,

were incapable of imposing on the meanest understanding. The authorities adduced in support of their favourite positions by those divines, who should be rather termed Laudians from their founder, than Puseyans or Froudians from their revivers, consisted of familiar and ordinary tropes, which were perverted from the figurative into a literal sense, to serve the exigency of the writer, and supply the deficiency of his resources. Their doctrines possessed neither the depth nor obscurity which could exhibit, on the removal of the mystic veil, those wonders of the sanctuary which are calculated to strike the Neophyte with surprise or admiration. In their views they possessed neither that vastness nor variety of prospect, which would requite the inquirer who toiled up an ascent previously unexplored, with novel scenes, or a more extended horizon. The subjects to which I now find myself introduced by them have been long familiar, and the paths by which they are reached common and beaten. In the plea which is advanced for the Church, I can perceive little more than a feeble revival of the dormant claims of my old acquaintance, the Jacobites and Nonjurors; who made a weak and ineffectual struggle to impede the advances of that sound and liberal policy, which, in bringing the native energies of the kingdom into action, has contributed, under Providence, to raise it to an unrivalled pitch of prosperity and glory."

We have digressed into this quotation upon naming Dr. Nolan's work; but our direct object was to observe, that he particularly mentions that Mr. Spencer found his way to Rome by the very route which Dr. Hook says never leads to it. The Rev. Thomas Sikes, alluded to in his statement, was the author of various tracts for popular circulation, besides that mentioned by Dr. Nolan. They were much of the same character in doctrine as the modern "Tracts for the Times." In our Review of three of them in 1803, p. 301, it was remarked, that the author's representations of "those who are stigmatised as Gospel preachers and evangelical ministers" were so grossly unfair, that they were "with difficulty to be justified even upon the most flexible principles of morality." Strange however to say, these three obnoxious tracts, one of them having the absurd and offensive title of "A dialogue between a Minister of the Church and his Parishioner concerning Gospel Preachers or Evangelical ministers," were for many years upon the catalogue of the publications of the Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge; till happily they were consigned, much to the honour of the Society, to the more appropriate "list of books and tracts at present out of print;" and they are not likely to be reprinted, unless the Editors of the Oxford Tracts should see fit to revive them. The more judicious members of the Christian Knowledge Society could not but see the impropriety of the very title;-to say nothing of the work. Mr. Sikes, who thus zealously avouched that he was not a Gospel preacher or Evangelical minister, was also the author of the first attack which was made upon the Bible Society, under the title of "A Country Clergyman;" to which the Rev. John Owen, by the instructions of Bishop Porteus, replied, under the signature of "A Suburban Clergyman." Mr. Sikes strongly opposed the free circulation of the word of God." The Socinian," said he," will make his Bible" [yes, his; but he cannot make the Anglican version] "speak and spread Socinianism; while the Calvinist, the Baptist, and the Quaker, will teach the opinions peculiar to their sect. Supply these men with Bibles-I speak as a true Churchman—and you supply them with arms against yourself." Mr. Owen observed many years after of this pamphlet, that it exhibited “ extravagant weakness and unmeasured scurrility," though it affected "a high tone of orthodoxy and churchmanship." Yet this was the very man-not any person stigmatised