to regard them as saints, and it is perfectly clear, that they would lower the standard of Christian piety and morals in the country. This, however, they are not likely to do. But, meantime, it is impossible for plain men of common understanding to avoid seeing, that the inevitable consequence of such perversions of ecclesiastical history can be nothing else than this; that, while, on the one hand,—all recommendations of the cultivation of mortified and self-denying habits and tempers will be received with distrust and suspicion,-on the other, -the remains of what deserves to be called Catholic feeling will be utterly destroyed;-that feeling, namely, which makes a Protestant of the nineteenth century cling to the thought, that, however the errors and superstitions of their times may have disfigured their piety, our forefathers and predecessors were men of real simplicity, earnest faith, and clearsighted wisdom. And the loss of this feeling will be a real loss. And when these authors have succeeded in persuading the world, that those whose names have been held sacred by Englishmen for ages, were no better than fanatics, and buffoons, and practical jokers, they will have inflicted an injury on the public mind, for which their system offers nothing sufficient to compensate. This thought

seems never to occur to them.

CHAPTER XXV.

PHARISAICAL AUSTERITIES: ST. WILLIAM.

NOR do these writers appear at all more conscious of the pharisaical character of the piety they are recommending. On the contrary, they seem to take it as a matter of course, that the austerities they describe were seen, and known, and public; and that power and admiration were the natural and egitimate rewards enjoyed by those who practised them. Take another example from the life of St. William:

In those days, when the blessed effects of penance and the discipline of the church were acknowledged by all true Christians, men would be as it were on the look-out, to hear of or see those who had given themselves up to the practice of sincere repentance, as persons for whom the Lord had done great things, whom only to see was a great privilege, and a most sure means of self-improvement. Thus we may imagine the fame of William's life at Winchester had reached the ears of all earnest and religious men, and they naturally longed to see him, not as it would be in these days, to criticise or ridicule, or to pronounce him a wild enthusiast and fanatic, who knew not the spirit of the Gospel, but to gaze upon him with devotion and reverence, if haply they might gain somewhat of his spirit, and receive from his holy lips words of comfort and encouragement.-St. William, pp. 47, 48.

Considering the erroneous doctrine this author has broached regarding the Lord's atonement, this sneer at those who are disposed to look on such characters as he describes as ignorant of "the spirit

of the gospel," is not very becoming.

The austeri

ties of St. William he tells us were practised because "he wished to do penance for his past sins, and to extinguish, by the abundance of his tears, the avenging punishment of future fire." And he further tells us,—and a very remarkable piece of dogmatic theology it is for a divine of the church of England to make himself responsible for,-that

The tears which gush from the really broken and contrite heart, unite in wonderful co-operation with the blood of the Holy Lamb, to wash, as we may say, once more the sinful soul. p. 44.

Persons who write in this way do not seem very competent judges of what "the spirit of the Gospel is." But this by the way. The sanctity of St. William "those wonderful, unearthly, and saintlike qualities, which, in technical language, are called heroic virtue'"t-those actions, the fame of which made people anxious "to gaze upon him with devotion and reverence," were pretty much what one has found so frequently recommended in these volumes as a mode of expiating sins:

for five long years he continued at the peaceful monastery, steadfast in the exercise of penance; constant and unwearied in prayers, and fastings, and nightly vigils, in the holy round of fast and festival, and sacred seasons, hoping for nothing and desiring nothing, but the forgiveness of his past sins, and grace to serve his Lord faithfully for the future. pp. 43, 44.

But how did all this get to be so universally † Page 41.

* Page 42.

known and talked of? People might be "on the look-out" as much as they pleased "to hear of or see" such a person; but all this took place in a monastery; and monks and hermits do not appear to have been in the habit of issuing a Court Circular to acquaint the world every day with St. William's doings in his cell, or how St. Neot went on in his fish-pond, or St. Bartholomew and St. German in their perennial shirts. To speak plainly, these authors seem to have no idea of any one practising austerities which are not to be seen or heard of; and the step from this to the ascetic's exhibiting himself for people "to gaze upon him with devotion and reverence," is but too short and too easy. The persons they describe may not have fallen into such a miserably low and degraded state;-a man of really catholic feeling would be sorry to learn that they ever did. But that is not a question of any pressing importance at present. Just now, it is of moment that the public should be fully aware of the system of doctrine, and piety, and morals, Mr. Newman and his party are labouring to propagate; and, looking at the question in this light, I cannot but think, it must be evident to any one who will take the trouble to make himself acquainted with their pubications, that the character of the devotions and austerities they are recommending is essentially pharisaical,-in the most offensive sense of the word, short of deliberate fraud and hypocrisy.

But is any considerable number of persons at all likely to be led astray by a system of teaching so palpably erroneous and unchristian, and-what is more to the point at present-so utterly uncongenial with the habits of English piety? It is not easy to determine such a question. Nor, I suppose, will the question, in this connexion, seem of much moment, except to those who are accustomed to measure the importance of falsehood or error by the evil it produces, and by their estimate of that evil and its proximity to determine, whether it be worth while to contradict the falsehood or expose the error. However, as to the likelihood of these notions becoming popular, it may be observed,-that, whoever be the party at whose risk and charge these Lives of the English Saints are published, a considerable sum must be embarked in the speculation, and (making every allowance for the zeal and perseverance with which Mr. Newman's party have from the outset laboured to propagate their opinions) it is scarcely to be supposed they would have brought out ten* volumes within the year, in so expensive a form, unless the circulation of the work had proved extensive enough to pay its expenses, at least. Of course, in the absence of private information, which on this point I do not pretend to possess, this can be no more than conjecture. Those who supply funds for the undertaking, may be con

VOL. I.

*Now fourteen.

M