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THE THIRTY-NINE ARTICLES

OF THE

CHURCH OF ENGLAND.

THE ELEVENTH OF
T»E PUBLIC COURSE OF LECTURES,
IN TRINITY TERM,
READ BEFORE THE UNIVERSITY,
IN THE DIVINITY SCHOOL, OXFORD, JUNE 1, 1842.

R. D. HAMPDEN, D.D.
REGIUS PROFESSOR OF DIVINITY,
CANON OP CHRIST CHURCH.

LONDON :
B. FELLOWKS, LUDOATE STREET
law. '

This Lecture was not composed for publication ;
but has been sent to the Press, at a very short notice,
at the particular request of several persons who
heard it.
Ch. Ch. June 4, 1842.

LECTURE XI.

And now that we may be supposed to have gone
through the several studies indicated in our analysis —
to have satisfied ourselves as to the canon of Scrip
ture, the genuine text, the laws of interpretation, the
authenticity and credibility of the volume of Scripture
and its doctrines, and the confirmation of the truth
to be obtained from ecclesiastical history — including
under that study an acquaintance with the patristic
remains, and all the documents and institutions of the
Church, — we may proceed in due order to that which
may properly be called the business of Exposition, as
distinct from the Investigation of Sacred Truth, and
as it is a superstructure to be raised upon it.
The business of Exposition will be found to consist
of two parts: — 1st, That of drawing forth the doc
trines of our religion into the several particulars into
which they are branched ; stating them correctly ; and
giving them their relative place and due importance
in the scheme of religion. 2nd, That of applying
them to the instruction and edification of the Church.
The first consideration would be briefly expressed by
the term Systematic Theology ; the second, by the

term Practical Theology. The first will form the
subject of this day's Lecture ; the second, that of
to-morrow's, and the conclusion of the present Course.
I remarked at the beginning of these Lectures,
that in collecting the information of Scripture we
were necessarily led — led, that is, by the constitution
of our minds — to form a System of theology. In the
Bible itself we have narrative, doctrine, and precept
interspersed with each other ; and when we come to
study the Bible, we naturally proceed to distribute
the particulars belonging to each into their respective
heads, and then further to arrange these several par
ticulars in their due order and place in each depart
ment. Thus we have Scripture-histories, giving the
events recorded in Scripture, detached from the other
matter, and chronologically arranged. We have trea
tises of Christian ethics, and selections of Christian
precepts ; and we have also summaries of Christian
doctrine, — Creeds, and Articles of religion. It is to
these last, in the most proper sense, that the term
Systematic Theology applies, since these undertake
to state the truths of religion as such j and they com
prise accordingly the Science of theology. This de
partment also obtains the name of Dogmatic Theo
logy j but this appellation denotes rather the several
formal propositions of which our theological System
consists than the whole sum of them, which is what
we mean when we .speak of Systematic Theology.
I assumed the truth, you will remember, at the

3
outset, of our Creeds and Articles, in order to cha
racterize our Theology, amidst the various discordant
views which might be taken of the subject ; that we
might, in fact, enter on our business in the spirit of
Church-of-England theologians. Our received for
mularies referred us to the Scriptures as the object of
our study in the search after divine knowledge ; and
we have accordingly been engaged in exploring the
Scriptures, examining into their divine character, and
acquainting ourselves with their contents. We have
now to ascertain the character of our guide — to shew
that it is faithful and true to those Scriptures to which
it conducts us — not encroaching on the prerogative
of Scripture, nor inconsistently enunciating any other
doctrines for divine, except what are found in the
volume itself of Scripture. We shall thus establish
at once their truth and importance — their truth, as
being scriptural ; their importance, as helping us to
a right collection and understanding and keeping of
Scripture-truths. Articles of Religion appear to differ from Creeds
in this respect, that they are designed principally for
teachers of the faith, whereas Creeds are designed
for the body of believers at large. Both are Confes
sions of the Faith. Both are summaries of what is to
be believed. But while the Creeds enable the be
liever to know and profess summarily the great doc
trines of revelation, Articles provide him with an
accurate enunciation of them, and enable him, as by

an outline, to define them with precision, distinguish
ing them from similar or erroneous views of the same
points, and thus to maintain a consistent body of
truth. Every believer indeed, hearer as well as
teacher, may thus apply a system of Articles to his
own edification in the faith. But this office of Ar
ticles is clearly of primary and direct importance to
the teacher, as it is indispensable that the doctrinal
statements of the teachers of the Church should all
speak one language, that language carefully guarded
from error ; and that amidst the diversity of exposi
tions they should know clearly, by the public voice
of the Church, what they are required to teach.
Creeds, as the more indispensable, since it con
cerns every Christian to know what he is called upon
to believe, at his very entrance into the Christian
faith, and to make some profession of it in order to
his baptism, naturally come in the history of Sys
tematic Theology before Articles. Creeds, accor
dingly, appear to have existed from the earliest times
of the preaching of the Gospel. The Apostles' Creed,
for example, though there is no evidence to prove its
being the work of the Apostles, undoubtedly descends
to us from apostolical times. There would be little
occasion comparatively for Articles of Religion in
the primitive ages, when the teachers of the Gospel
had the teaching of their Lord and His Apostles as
yet sounding in their ears j and whilst the Church at
large, however divided in place or time, remained,

with some partial exceptions, uncorrupted. Errors
indeed there were, and gross errors, of doctrine, ac
companying the first propagation of the Gospel. But
those errors had not at first infected the catholic
body of the Church, so as to call for the remedy of
formal Articles of religion, until the time of the Coun
cil of Nicaea, in A. D. 325. For the first Council of
the Apostles and Elders and the whole Church at
Jerusalem was directed rather to the preservation of
liberty and peace in the Church, than to the incul
cation of doctrine ; enjoining as it did the refraining
from imposing any burthen on Christians, beyond ab
stinence from "meats offered to idols, and from blood,
and from things strangled, and from fornication ;" and
of the like nature, for the most part, were the subse
quent provincial Councils antecedent to that of Nicaea.
The Decrees of Councils, accordingly, in the early
ages, occupied the place of Articles of Religion.
They were decisions of points of doctrine, for the in
struction of the whole Church, called forth from time
to time, by peculiar needs, by the rise of errors af
fecting this or that doctrine of the Faith ; having im
mediately in view, as we may observe, the teachers
in the church, and the doctrine to be taught by them.
Thus, the Council of Nicaea condemned the Arian
teachers, and their doctrine, and set forth the true
Faith, according to the Scriptures, as that which alone
should be professed and taught in the Church. The
second General Council, that of Constantinople, in

6
380, condemning the doctrine of Macedonius, as
serted the divinity of the Holy Spirit, and gave ad
ditional sanction to what had been previously esta
blished at Nicaea.
The third General Council, that of Ephesus, in
A.D. 481, — condemning the errors of Nestorius, who
denied the hypostatical union of the divine and hu
man natures in Christ ; and of Pelagius and Celestius,
denying the doctrine of original sin, — ruled authori
tatively what should be held and taught in the Church
on these points. And the fourth General Council,
that of Chalcedon, A.D. 451, whilst it also con
demned the Nestorian doctrine of a division of Per
sons in Christ, condemned the contrary error propa
gated by Eutyches, that of the confusion of the
Godhead and manhood of Christ in one Person, and
thus set forth to the Christian world what should be
received and taught as sound doctrine on this head.
And so, last of all, the case of the Council of Trent,
A.D. 1545 — 1568, is an illustration of the same
fact. It was a teaching in counteraction of the teach
ing of the leaders of the Reformation. The system
of doctrine and worship in the Churches under the
authority of the Pope had been so assailed by the
spirit of reformation, and every expedient to restore
uniformity had so entirely failed, that it became ne
cessary to restate and formally promulgate the doc
trines which should be held by the members of the
Roman communion, and give its ministers an au-

thentic manual of the system which they should teach.
At the same period, it may be observed, Pope Pius
IV. (in 1564) set forth that Creed which passes by
his name, or Prqfessio Fidei Tridentince, as a stand
ard of belief for the members at large of the Church —
that consummation of apostacy from the simple Gos
pel, substituting belief in the teachers of the Church
for belief in the Word of God.
The rise of what are more properly called Articles
of Religion, or Confessions of Faith, such as our
Thirty-nine Articles, may be referred to the occa
sions which arose at the commencement of the Re
formation, for asserting and maintaining sound doctrine
against the errors of Rome. The early Reformers
were called upon by others, and were themselves
anxious to shew that they held the fundamental
articles of the Christian Faith ; that they claimed a
liberty from the power and superstition of the Church
of Rome on no other grounds but such as might well
be conceded to sober-minded Christian men. For
the sake too of their own followers, it was necessary
to draw up a formulary of doctrine, lest there should
be any doubt as to what the reformation in hand was
tending ; that men's minds might not be unsettled
generally, but might have something definite to hold
to — might be guarded on all the great saving truths
of the Gospel. Such, accordingly, was the character
of the first Confession of Faith put forth by the Re
formers in Germany- -the celebrated Confession of

Augsburgh, in A.D. 1530. This Confession was
drawn up by Melancthon, to be presented at the
Diet of Augsburgh by those princes of the Germanic
empire who had, only the year before, by their public
remonstrance against the decree of the Diet of Spire,
which revoked every concession before made to thera
in the matter of religion, established the glorious
name of Protestant as a rallying point to the Chris
tian world against the corruptions of Rome. Charles
the Fifth, aroused by this strenuous remonstrance of
the Protestant princes, and finding his efforts in
effectual to prevail on the Pope, Clement VII., to
call a General Council for the settlement of religion,
determined on the endeavour to arbitrate in the dis
putes by his own authority at the Diet to be held at
Augsburgh. Hitherto there was no formula of the
doctrines professed by the Reformers. There had
been only some statements of their views proposed
by Luther in a document consisting of seventeen
articles, at one of the conventions of the Protestant
princes in the previous year, 1529. This served as
the basis on which Melancthon, by the order and
authority of the Elector of Saxony and the other
princes, drew up the Augsburgh Confession in its
present form.
The tenour of this celebrated Confession of Faith
marks the occasion ofit. It consists of twenty-eight
articles — of which the first twenty-one relate to mat
ters of faith, and are strictly didactic ; the remaining

seven are protests against the abuses of doctrine and
practice introduced in the Church of Rome. Thus
did it furnish those who were engaged in the great
work of the Reformation, whether as teachers or
hearers, with sound and stable principles of doctrine,
and guard them from wild and heretical innovations
on the faith ; whilst, at the same time, it gave a
steadiness of aim and of proceeding to the Re
formers, and a warning to the supporters of the cor
ruptions of Rome, by pointing out the errors and
abuses against which they protested.
The Confession of Augsburgh is peculiarly import
ant and interesting to us, not only as the first autho
ritative document of the faith of the Reformers, and
as attesting accordingly the sound Christian spirit
and religious moderation in which the work of Re
formation, as an act of the Christian Church, was
undertaken, (whatever may have been the excesses of
individuals,) but as the model from which our own
Confession of Faith (our Thirty-nine Articles,) was
composed.3 For not only has the substance of this
Confession been embodied in the Thirty-nine Articles,
but the very expressions of it have in great measure
• Some of the Articles at the revision in Queen Elizabeth's reign,
when Parker was archbishop, were either partly or wholly copied from
the Wirtemberg Confession, viz. 2nd, 5th, 6th, 10th, 11th, 12th, and
20th. The Wirtemberg Confession, a compendium and repetition of
the Augsburgh, was composed in 1551, and in the following year ex
hibited by the Wirtemberg ambassadors at Trent — Laurence, Bamp.
Lect. p. 248. 332. C

10
been adopted in the Articles. And we know, too,
that Melancthon, the author of it, was especially
consulted by Cranmer in the carrying on the Refor
mation in England. Our Articles, too, follow the
example of this Confession in the same resoluteness
and firmness of doctrinal statement, leaving nothing
ambiguous and wavering in regard to the substance
of the truths asserted, whilst they use, as that Con
fession also does, great moderation in regard to the
language in which they are asserted. But of this I
shall have occasion to say more presently. b
The Augsburgh Confession, however admirably
adapted as it was to its purpose, and though it did
serve that purpose so far as to be ever afterwards a
standard of doctrine to the leading Reformers, was
not successful as an instrument of pacification. Nor
could it indeed be expected to be so, when it was
evident that, in the great movements of those days,
the schemes of political rulers, rather than a sincere
design for the advancement of the Gospel and the
peace of the Church, were the motive principles of
events. The Emperor wished on the one hand to
restrain the power of the Pope in his dominions, and
on the other to weaken that of the princes of the
empire ; so that we find him alternately listening to
b The Apology, or Defence of the Confession, was drawn up by the
same author as the Confession itself, and at the same period ; and has
always obtained an equal authority, being enumerated with it among
the symbolical books of the Lutherans. — Laurence, Bampton Lectures,
p. 262.

11
the proposals on each side, and trying to effect a
compromise between the conflicting parties, so as to
establish his own ascendancy over both in the result.
We need scarcely wonder therefore that this Confes
sion, wise and temperate as it was, should not have
allayed the persecuting spirit, but should rather have
been met by a furious opposition, which would listen
to no arguments or expostulations. The Reformers,
however, continued to support the ground which they
had thus taken, by further statements and defences of
their doctrines ; and a series of documents were the
result of these proceedings, which, in their collective
form, constitute what are now called the symbolical
books of the Lutheran Church. At the same time
the other great section of the Reformers, — the Hel
vetic or Reformed, as they were distinguished by
name from the Lutheran, differing from the Lutherans
chiefly on the doctrine of the Eucharist, — published
their Confessions of Faith.
Nor were the formularies proposed by the Re
formers the only attempts made to restore uniformity
of Christian profession at this period. The Council
of Trent had met in 1545, but was soon after broken
up, — on the rumour of a pestilence having appeared at
Trent, — without proceeding far in the discussions of
the controversies which it was designed to settle.
But the distracted state of Germany, and the impa
tience of Charles Vth, could not brook the delay
thus artfully interposed by the Pope, Paul Illrd.,

12
in the deliberations of the Council. Accordingly,
Charles the Vth, in the year 1548, had that formula
drawn up, which, from the purpose for which it was
set forth, — being intended as a temporary mea
sure, to have force only during the suspension of the
Council of Trent, — obtained the name of the Interim.
It was sufficiently objectionable to the Pope and the
adherents of the established system of the Church,
that this paper was put forth by imperial authority, —
that it did not emanate from an ecclesiastical source ;
and that it appeared to substitute another Confession
on points which had already been ruled at the first
sittings of the Council. It appeared also to favour
the Lutherans, inasmuch as it taught the importance
of faith, and said nothing of the merits or condignity
of good works ; and asserted the virtue of the Sacra
ments to be dependent on the faith of the receivers ;
and tolerated also the marriage of priests, and distri
bution of the cup to the laity. It was therefore
assailed with strong remonstrances on the part of the
papists, and with argumentative refutations. Nor did
it satisfy the Reformers ; since, though it put in a
prominent light many doctrines on which they laid
great stress, — as, the corruption of human nature, the
sole redemption by the blood of Christ, the necessity
of faith, and of divine grace throughout, to make
man just and holy in the sight of God, — yet it enforced
also many gross Romish superstitions. So that
though the Emperor, anc| the theologians whom he

13
employed, endeavoured to palliate the offence at
Rome, by asserting that it was intended for the Lu
therans, and not obligatory on the adherents of Rome,
the Reformers, with the Elector of Saxony at their
head, refused to submit to it. The conciliatory spirit,
indeed, of Melancthon induced a partial submission ;
and some of the cities, which had at first sternly
resisted the imposition of the formula, were awed
into submission for a time. But the Reformers,
on the whole, regarded it only, as it was in truth,
an attempt to reconcile them to papal corruptions
under a less obnoxious form. The Interim was,
in fact, an expedient for paralyzing the efforts of re
formers, by speaking in the tone of the Confession of
Augsburgh, whilst it breathed the spirit of popery.
And while these efforts towards a restoration of
uniformity of doctrine, by the imposition of authori
tative formularies, were proceeding in the parent
country of the Reformation, the first rude attempts
were made in our own country towards the formation
of a standard of doctrine. In 1536, Henry the
Eighth, with the advice of Cranmer, published a
set of Articles, or short code of Doctrine, in which
the fundamental truths of religion were set forth,
but with them also the doctrine of transubstan
tiation, though not under that name. For Cran
mer, even long after he appeared as a reformer
of religion, held to this grievous error, so obsti
nately indeed as to persecute to death those who

14
denied»it. It was only late in his career of reform,
and by conference with Ridley, whose learning led
him to the reading of the work of Ratramn, (a work
composed in the ninth century, against the Romanist
doctrine,) that he was brought to the renunciation of
the error. Still these Articles, though far from a
faithful protest against the corruptions of Rome,
were of some service towards a future more effectual
reform. There was no mention of four of the
reputed seven sacraments of Rome. And though
the doctrine of purgatory was asserted, it was sepa
rated from some of the gross abuses with which it
had been associated. Both the place and the nature
of the pains of purgatory were spoken of as doubtful ;
and the unprofitableness of the pardons from the
Pope, and of masses for the souls of the dead, was
significantly intimated. Then there was no reference
to the authority of Tradition or of the Church in con
troversies of faith, but . only to the Bible and the
three Creeds as standards of doctrine. And all
immediate worship of saints and of images was
removed. c
These Articles exactly correspond with that idea
which I have given of the nature of such formularies
in general, as intended primarily for the teachers of
religion. They were throughout directions to the
"bishops and preachers" as to what they were to
teach the people. They follow, we find, the Confes-
e See Burnet's Reformation, vol. i. p. 456.

15
sion of Augsburgh by six years ; and they indicate a
considerable impression already made in this country
by the religious spirit of the Reformation. For the
Articles refer to matter of Christian doctrine and
practice. And I speak of the religious spirit of the
Reformation in this country, as distinct from the
secular efforts of Henry the Eighth to emancipate
himself and the administration of religion in England
from the papal dominion, which indirectly tended to
the reform of religion.
These Articles of 1536 clearly prepared the way
for those which followed, though at a considerable in
terval, — the forty-two Articles of Edward the Sixth's
reign, passed in the year 1552. During, indeed, the
eleven years which intervened between the Articles
of 1536 and Henry's death in 1547, other measures
were taken towards reform, as by an authorized trans
lation of the Bible in 1539, and by the publication
of the two treatises — " The Institution of a Christian
Man," in 1537, and " A necessary Doctrine and Eru
dition for any Christian Man," in 1543. But at the
same time there was a strong re-action of the spirit of
popery ; as was testified by the tumultuary insurrec
tion in the north of England, in 1536 and the fol
lowing year ; and in particular by the tyrannical and
bloody " Act of the Six Articles," in 1589, which in
flicted death on the denial of transubstantiation, and on
all who should assert the necessity of communicating in
both kinds, and on all again who should deny the Divine

16
prohibition of the marriage of the clergy, and the
Divine sanction of monastic vows, or who impugned
private masses and auricular confession. Then the
first years of Edward's reign were employed in active
exertions to stop the idolatrous practices and super
stitions among the people ; in the preparation of
homilies and a reformed liturgy. These great and
most necessary measures of reform having been com
pleted, the forty-two Articles of 1552 were at length
published, as a standard of doctrine for the clergy.
The Council of Trent had then framed its decrees
respecting justification, and baptism, and the eucha
rist, and penance, and extreme Unction, and the
Scriptures, and Tradition.
These Articles accordingly came out very appro
priately at this time, to protest against the errors on
these subjects, to which the Council had just given
its sanction, and to establish a sound form of doctrine
throughout the country. In substance and expression
they are, for the most part, the same as our present
standard, the Articles promulgated eleven years after
wards, (in 1563,) in the reign of Elizabeth, and again
a second time, with some revisions of the language,
in 157 1 : tne three additional Articles, (the 39th,
on the Resurrection of the dead, asserting the Resur
rection to be not yet past — the 41st, against the
supporters of the millenium — the 42nd, against the
doctrine of Origen respecting the final salvation of
all men,) having been retrenched as unnecessary.

17
The Church of England standard of doctrine may
thus be justly regarded as the matured wisdom of
the Church itself in its efforts of reformation. For
it appears, that our Thirty-nine Articles were not
suddenly framed and adopted on the pressure of the
moment, as were the decrees of the Council of Trent,
but were the result of a slow and deliberate proceed
ing on the part of the Church ; having been finally
approved and sanctioned in their present form, not
by those only who originally framed them, but by
other persons in authority in the Church, at the
distance of nearly twenty years. The Council of
Trent, too, had at this latter period finally closed
its sittings and put forth its decrees. So that our
Thirty-nine Articles, as re-affirmed in 1571, may
be regarded with truth as protests against the cor
ruptions of doctrine maintained throughout that
Council, no less than against those particular errors
which had already obtained its sanction when the
Articles were first composed. Thus, in treating of
the Article on Purgatory, Bishop Burnet notices
the variation of language in the Article as re
published in Elizabeth's reign from what it had
been in Edward's reign. It speaks of the Romish
h Tho Articles were originally composed in Latin ; " nor were they
ever subscribed in English until the Convocation of 1571. Previously
to that year, the English editions materially varied, while the Latin
(errors of the press excepted) remained the same, unless where altera
tions were introduced by authority." — Laurence's Bampton Lectures,
p. 336. D

18
doctrine, whereas before it had been the doctrine
of schoolmen. "The plain reason of this is," he
says, " that these errors were not so fully es
poused by the body of the Roman Church, when
those Articles were first published ; so that some
writers that softened matters threw them upon the
schoolmen ; and therefore the Article was cautiously
worded in laying them there. But before these that
we have now were published, the Decree and Canon
concerning the Mass had passed at Trent, in which
most of the heads of this Article are either affirmed
or supposed ; though the formal Decree concerning
them was made some months after these Articles
were published." And in discussing this Article he
examines it as being the established doctrine of the
whole Roman Church. This sufficiently shews, that
the Articles against the corruptions of Rome were
not against mere floating traditionary errors in that
Church, but against the formal adoption of those cor
ruptions by the Church of Rome in the Council of
Trent. Articles so framed, and so left to the Church, can
not be lightly esteemed. It is a disparagement of
the wisdom and authority of those by whom they were
bequeathed to us as a legacy of sound doctrine, to
endeavour to set them aside or explain them away in
any manner. Honestly and reverently to deal with
them, we must either accept them or reject them,
according to their plain meaning : reject them, if

19
we can disprove them — which it will be a hard task
for any sincere searcher into Scripture to do ; accept
them — as I think, on the other hand, every sincere
inquirer into Scripture must do — if they are in ac
cordance with the teaching of the word. We should
observe, indeed, the same moderation which they do.
As we should not relax them in any^way, neither
should we strain them beyond their manifest inten
tion. We are not, in short, to bring in any extrinsic
principles to their interpretation, but to interpret
them simply by what they say in themselves, together
with any illustration that may be drawn from their
history and the controversies against which they were
directed. It is most necessary indeed to a just interpretation
of the Articles, that we should rightly conceive the
nature of that moderation in which they have been
framed. That moderation does not consist in the
latitude of various interpretations which they may be
supposed to admit, but in their evident comprehen
siveness ; in the breadth of their teaching ; in what
they expressly include and state : — not in any reser
vation, or tacit meanings left open to each man's pri
vate judgment, to suggest or supply as he may think
proper. The Council of Trent has couched its deci
sions in ambiguous phraseology, so as to leave an
opening to discordant opinions, amidst an external
uniformity of statement. Not so, however, the com
pilers of our Articles. Melancthon, whose opinions

20
and feelings seem throughout to have guided their
proceedings, was especially adverse to any such dis-
ingenuousness, any such artificial method of uniting
dissentients in the profession of a common formula.
He declared that, according to his judgment, every
thing in theology should be expressed without ambi
guity ; that things should be called by their proper
names j and thus that perfect simplicity should be
aimed at in drawing up a Confession of Faith. We
cannot suppose therefore that our Reformers had it in
contemplation to say one thing in their own sense,
and mean another thing in the sense of another per
son. They cannot, for instance, be supposed to have
written down expressions on the subject of the Divine
Predestination adverse to the extreme Calvinistic
view, and yet to have so framed them as to enable the
Calvinist to explain them in his own sense. Nor, on
the other hand, can they be supposed so to have de
clared themselves against the extreme Arminian
view of the same subject, as to have designedly
allowed a refuge to the Arminian under the ambiguity
of the terms.
But what persons would do, who desired to mode
rate between opposing parties, neither of whom they
might judge to be unworthy, on account of their
opinions, to be excluded from the communion of the
Church, would be openly and unreservedly to pro
pose a scheme of comprehension — to admit in a
moderate, candid, and simple sense the opinion of

21
each party, and thus include each expressly within
the terms of the formulary.
And this our Reformers appear to have done, in
treating of the subjects of Predestination and Free
will. Following Scripture, they have neither so
asserted the Divine Predestination as to exclude the
doctrine of Free-will, nor so spoken of the Free-will
of man as to extenuate the truth of Divine Predes
tination. Both parties, accordingly, if they be only
moderate in their views of each doctrine, and not
disposed to push their respective opinions to the ex
treme of the logical consequences from them, so as
to exclude the opposite, may find their opinions ex
pressed in the Articles. The doctrine of the Divine
Predestination is strongly asserted in the Articles,
free from its objectionable consequences ; as is also
the doctrine of Free-will. For it is not denied on this
point that man has a free-will, but only that this will
is not able of itself to do any thing pleasing to God —
not that the will of man is in bondage, (as Luther in
one of his controversial treatises boldly attempted
to prove,) but only that God must be the first mover
of the will and constant cooperator with it ; which is
perfectly consistent with the Divine Predestination and
with the freedom of man, though we cannot explain
how the two principles are combined in operation.
Again ; though Faith is described in the Articles,
as that which alone justifies the sinner ; this is not
so asserted as to enable the Solifidian or Antinomian

22
to subscribe the Articles : for whilst good works
of every kind are thereby excluded from meriting
remission of sins and acceptance with God for their
own sake, yet are good works further spoken of as
pleasing and acceptable to God in Christ, per Chris
tum, and as not the less necessary because they are
not meritorious — necessary, in fact, as the necessary
fruits of a lively faith in Christ. Hence both those
who are disposed to dwell on the fulness of God's
promises in Christ, and the abundant efficacy of
His grace in justifying the sinner, — and those, on the
other hand, who dwell on the calls to holiness by the
Gospel, and the rewards and punishments with which
that holiness is enforced, and the acts of dutiful
obedience to God's commandments due for His
great love towards us in Christ, — may find their views
fully expressed in the combined statements of the
Articles. Again ; will any one believe that the sixth Article,
on the Sufficiency of Holy Scripture for salvation,
has been so worded as to admit the opposite opinion
of its Insufficiency ? It does not indeed expressly
say, that Tradition is not to be received as a source
of doctrine, or part of the rule of faith ; but it surely
very evidently excludes those who say that Scripture
and Tradition are the joint rule of faith, not only by
its silence about Tradition, but by speaking of
Scripture alone, in stating the source and authority for
doctrine necessary to salvation.

23
Or when the Articles assert that the Bishop of
Rome hath no jurisdiction in this realm of England,
can we suppose, with any plausibility, that they may
be subscribed by those who hold, as the Romanists
do, that the Pope ought to have jurisdiction in Eng
land, and only own the evident matter of fact that he
has not? Or that when the Articles exclude the
belief in the expiatory virtue of masses for the quick
and dead as blasphemous, they are indulgent towards
a belief in the mass in general as a propitiatory sa
crifice. Such, I feel sure, is not the moderation of the
Church in its Articles. It is rather, as appears from
the instances before stated, a moderation of express
statements on controverted points — an unreserved
candour towards contending views — not an apparent
favouring of one side whilst another is tacitly sup
ported — not an apparent denial of doctrines which
they do not really oppose — but an open confessed
acknowledgment of the truth on each controverted
point, on whichever side it might be found.
There is a caution, too, to be observed in estimating
this moderation, which it may be well to notice. You
may be apt to suppose that it consists in preserving
an equal distance from certain opposite extremes, or
that in all cases of controversy a via media is neces
sarily the right one. A moderation of this kind
would result rather in a general latitudinarianism,
than in a proper maintenance of the truth. For

24
there are cases where what might be called the ex
treme view is the right one, — as in the doctrine of
the perfect Divinity of our Lord, compared with the
low Socinian view of His sole humanity, and the in
termediate Arian hypothesis of His angelic nature.
To take another instance. The true doctrine of Sa
cramental grace is not a middle point between the
Romanist theory of the opus operatum, and the
theory, on the other hand, which reduces the Sacra
ments to mere signs ; for it would then be something
less than the opus operatum, and something more
than the outward sign ; but the true doctrine tran
scends them both. It places not the virtue of the Sa
crament in any thing done by man — in any outward
element or form of words, or ritual — but in the pro
mises of God attending the due administration and
reception of it, according to the institution of Christ ;
and thus derives its virtue from a far higher, holier, and
more unfailing source than the doctrine of the opus
operatum ; and in this respect, as compared with that
doctrine, is an extreme. To take another instance.
The Church of England doctrine of the Sufficiency
of Scripture is not a medium between an extreme of
the undue exaltation of Scripture — for we cannot put
the value and importance of Scripture too high — and
those views of it which either place it on a level with
the traditions of the Church, (as those of the Ro
manists,) or assimilate it to the writings of uninspired
men, (as those of the Socinians ;) but it is an ultimate

25
point beyond these. We maintain the Scripture in
our Articles to be all-sufficient ; we do not balance
between a reverence to Scripture and a reverence to
other authorities, but we ascribe an exclusive sanctity
to Scripture, and reject every other authority, as
divine and conclusive in the matter of divine truth.
The moderation of the Church, accordingly, is to
be estimated from its candid pursuit of the truth in
every question. And we must not invert the case
and say that it has attained the truth because it has
sought a middle way. Often, indeed, the middle
way is the right way ; that is, the avoidance of either
extreme will be the right line of belief and conduct.
For example, we must neither carry our notions of
Church-government so far as to un-church all who
do not enjoy the same advantages as ourselves, nor
sink them so low as to hold it a matter of indifference
what form of government may be adopted in a
Church. Nor whilst we teach the general necessity
of the Sacraments, and guard against any lax view of
their importance, must we regard them in such a way
as to hold, that without them there can be no salva
tion. In such points as these our Church wisely
keeps clear of extremes, and in doing so leads us in
the middle way, the way of truth and right. The
truth, however, here is, as in morals. It is not the
middle way that is always the right way ; but the
right way is the middle way.
I speak of the interpretation of the Articles in the
E

26
first instance ; because in using them as a guide and
index to our theological inquiries, we must be careful,
above all, not to sophisticate our guide — we must
understand them plainly, according to their direct
import — or we shall be, in fact, only following our own
imaginations, instead of humbly availing ourselves of
their instruction and guidance.
For my part, I know of no reference which we are
entitled to make for the understanding of the Articles
but Scripture itself. We have heard it said lately,
that the Articles can only be received so far as they
are consistent with the teaching of the Catholic
Church — that, being the offspring of an un-catholic
age, (as the period of the Reformation has been dis
paragingly called,) they must be construed according
to the tenor of their reception and sanction by the
supposed more catholic spirit of a subsequent period,
and not in the sense of the reformers and framers of
them, — not, consequently, in their own original and
proper sense. To assert this, is to abandon alto
gether the guidance of the Articles, and to substitute
each man's own glosses, or modifications of the doc
trines contained in them, for their simple declarations.
For the Articles clearly give us but one criterion of
sacred truth. They do not say, that whatsoever is
not catholic, whatsoever has not universal consent in
its favour, is not to be thought necessary, or required
of any one to be believed, in order to salvation ; but
only what is not read in Scripture, or proved thereby.

27
By the test of Scripture, accordingly, they are them
selves to be tried. If they may be proved by Scrip
ture, they must be held true by those who acknow
ledge them, independently of any other criterion.
And as those who did not regard them as answering
to this test would not be justified in professing an
assent to them ; still less could any persons honestly
declare an allegiance to them, who should regard
them as needing explanation from without, to bring
them into conformity with catholic doctrine.
Nothing is more dangerous than this spirit of con
ciliation, applied to systems of doctrine. It is a
stealthy and treacherous removing of landmarks, spe
cially set up to enable men to know what is their
own, and what is not. If parties had openly agreed
to remove these monuments of separation, there
would be nothing to complain of in such an arrange
ment. Thus there has been nothing wrong in the
open attempts' made on different occasions, — as, for
example, by Archbishop Wake, — to reconcile the
Churches of England and Rome. But to proceed,
by wearing away the landmarks themselves, which
define the territory of each Church, and gently efface
the inscriptions on them, so that it can scarcely be
discerned where one ends and the other begins;
this is a process of conciliation which cannot be too
much reprobated. Let conciliation be carried to the
utmost, as far as persons are concerned. Let us try
to make men at peace with one another, however

28
dissentient, however at variance. But let not prin
ciples and doctrines be subjected to such treatment.
The approximation of man to man must ever be a
work of charity and truth. But the approximation
of truth to error can only be a hollow agreement,
and confusion of truth with error.
We may be warned, indeed, by a sad experience
against so fallacious and dangerous a method of inter
preting the statements of our formularies of faith.
Attempts of this kind were the forerunners of the
outbreak of Puritanism in Charles the First's reign,
and of infidelity in the reign of his successor. There
are extant at least two celebrated works by writers
of our own country, though composed in Latin, for
the more general use of the learned, in which there
is the most studious endeavour to explain the doc
trines of our Church in harmony with those of the
Church of Rome. The first is by Forbes, who
was appointed the first Bishop of Edinburgh by
Charles the First, on his visit to Scotland, in 1623 ;
though Forbes did not venture, it appears, to publish
it during his lifetime, but left it, at his death, in the
hands of a friend, to be published at any suitable
occasion. This work accordingly was sent forth, as
the editor avows, for the purpose of reconciliation,
amidst his complaints that men were misrepresenting
this method of peace, and his regrets that persons were
taking occasion at that time for deserting the Church
of England and going over to Rome. It was evi-

29
dently intended therefore to keep persons from going
off in the direction of Rome, by shewing how far they
might agree in opinion with Rome, and yet remain
members of the Church of England in profession.
It is entitled Considerationes Modestce et Pacificoe
Controversiarum, de Justificatione, Purgatorio, In
vocatione Sanctorum et Christo Mediatore : a work in
one volume, 12mo. printed in London, in 1658 ; being
described also in the title as Opus posthumum diu
desideratum. It accordingly treats those several
topics in the method of conciliation with Rome.
For example, in regard to the invocation of angels,
the author asserts, that the more learned Protestants
do not deny that all angels generally, and those who
especially take care of us in particular causes and
necessities, pray for us, or that our prayers are offered
to God by those angels ; only they understand a
ministerial, and not a propitiatory oblation of our
prayers. He would substitute then advocation for
invocation — they may be "called to, but not called
upon" — their names may be introduced in our prayers
ex abundanti. And of Purgatory ; he asserts the
opinion of the most learned and moderate of the age
to be in favour of a purgatory in which lighter sins
may be removed after death, in a future life, by the
intercession of the Church, but not by the endurance
of the pains of purgatory, which he speaks of as the
fiction of the Romanists. It is remarkable, too, that he
distinguishes between purgatorium quale astruunt

30
Romani and purgatorium Romanensium, very
much after the manner of the Ninetieth Tract for
the Times. In the style of the same Tract, he con
siders throughout the statements of the Church of
England as directed rather against the abuses of the
Church of Rome, than against the doctrines of Rome
in themselves. The other work to which I allude was
the treatise of the Franciscan, Christopher Daven
port, who assumed, on his admission into the Francis
can order, the name of Sancta a Clara, by which he is
better known. He had been in youth a member of
the Church of England, and a member of Merton
College, but at an early age passed over to Douay,
and was converted there to the Roman faith ; though
much of his time, as we learn, was passed afterwards
in this University, where he is said to have greatly
recommended himself, by his address, to the society
of the place. This work was published at Lyons, in
1634. As the work of a Romanist, it was designedly
undertaken for the purpose of making proselytes to
Rome. It is entitled, Deus, Natura, Gratia sive
Tractatus de Prcedestatione de Meritis et Peccato
rum Remissione, seu de Justificatione, et denique de
Sanctorum Invocatione, and professes to examine the
English Confession, or the Thirty-nine Articles, on
each of these points, and discuss its differences with
respect to the Catholic faith. In the sequel, it gives
a paraphrastic exposition of the remaining Articles,
not included in the above. Great hopes appear to

31
have been entertained from it by the Romanists, as
we may perceive from the testimonials prefixed to it
from learned Doctors of the Sorbonne ; one of which
states, that the publication will be pleasing to the
more moderate Protestants, and dispose them to a
re-union with the Church of Rome, until the oppor
tunity shall arrive ; and in the mean time will inure
in them a more reverent estimation — publicatio operis
Protestantibus moderatioribus arridebit (omnibus
placere difficillimum) et ad readunationem cum
Ecclesia Romana, dum opportunumfuerit, disponet,
et interim reverentiorem estimationem inuret.
The following are examples of this author's mode
of exposition. On the Article, on Works of Super
erogation, he premises there is no altercation at
all — nulla prorsus altercatio inter doctiores Protes-
tantes et nos — referring to Hooker's Eccl. Polit. iii.
sec. 8, (alluding, as I suppose, to Hooker's defence
against the Puritans, of the use of certain regulations
and ceremonies in the Church, in addition to the po
sitive commands of God in Scripture — which is really
nothing to his purpose,) and to others, as shewing
this. Then coming to the Article itself, he admits,
that the determination of it, to confess the truth,
would seem somewhat hard, did not the subsequent
words diminish the difficulty. The words he means
are ; that men declare, by works of supererogation,
that " they do more for God's sake, than of bounden
duty is required :" for that these words, if rightly ex-

32
pounded according to the rules of the School, mean
"more than is required of them in any way, or by
any right." Such works accordingly, he contends, the
Article condemns ; and so, he adds, do the Romanists.
The Article also, he adds, speaks of the works of the
natural man, not of man with God's grace present to
him, and assisted by it : whereas the Roman doctrine
of supererogation applies to "man instructed by the
grace of God." He concludes, accordingly, that the
Article has nothing against works of supererogation,
rightly understood. So again, in the same strain of
gratuitous assumption, he concludes — respecting the
invocation of saints, purgatory, indulgences, the adora
tion of images and relics — that the Articles do not
reject these things in se, in themselves, but only the
Roman doctrine about them all ; that is, not what the
Roman Church itself holds, but the doctrine falsely
imputed to Rome, the doctrine which passes under
the name of the Roman Doctrine.
I have brought forward these instances, (and a
great number might be adduced to the same effect
from these and other works of the same character,
published about the same period,) as proofs, that
the method of conciliation practised on the Ar
ticles, by interpreting them according to some ex
trinsic principles, and not by their own plain and
direct meaning, is nothing new in the Church ; and
also, that no good will result from it to the cause of
truth and the Church, but rather serious evil. For

33
who would wish to see that state of things return,
when the violent counteraction to this insidious spirit
of false conciliation rent the Church, and for a while
established an anarchy within it ; or when, after the
Restoration and the re-establishment of the Church
in form, infidelity and scepticism, the natural effect of
the previous struggle for the mastery between the
contending extremes of Popery and Puritanism, widely
spread themselves through the higher classes of so
ciety, with their attendant train of immoralities. We
had indeed still excellent and learned divines in our
Church, who laboured to maintain the truth without
compromise, and to whose exertions we are, doubtless,
greatly indebted for the preservation of the sound
faith of our Church to this day. But we are to look
to the evil effect generally — to the mischief actually
produced by such insincere schemes of accommo
dation — and be warned accordingly by past expe
rience how we put ourselves in the like situation of
danger to that from which, through God's providence,
we have once happily escaped.
Let me then earnestly direct you to the simple
study of the Articles and formularies of the Church
generally, by the light of Scripture. Take them in
their plain grammatical sense, and compare them with
the text of the Bible. Apply them as a key to the
unlocking of the treasure of divine truth there re
vealed, and observe whether they open that sense
naturally and without force. Examine them again,

34
as a result collected from the Bible, and observe
whether they follow by just and valid inference from
a survey of the whole teaching of the Bible.
I cannot doubt that he who searches Scripture
with a humble and docile mind, interrogating them
throughout as they testify to the Lord Jesus Christ
and Him crucified, comparing things spiritual with
spiritual, by a large and accurate induction ; availing
himself of every help and guide for understanding of
the same from human sources, and still more especially
from the counsels of God's Holy Spirit, sought by de
vout prayer and active conformity to the will of God in
Christ, — I cannot doubt, I say, that one thus inves
tigating Scripture will end his researches in becom
ing, at least in all material points, — and supposing
him to have no strong antecedent prejudices against
our doctrines, — a sincere member of the Church of
England, as it is defined in the Articles and formu
laries of the Church, upon immovable scriptural con
viction of their truth and value. It is obviously quite
out of the compass of one, or even of a few Lectures,
to enter into such an examination of the Articles, as
I here prescribe, by the light of Scripture. I con
sider it enough for my present purpose, that I direct
you to such an examination, as the only proper me
thod of satisfying the conscience of each, whether he
be a true member of the Church or no. No glosses
on the text of the Articles, no extrinsic principles of
interpretation of them, can suffice for this point.

35
They can only end in producing ultimately disquie
tude of mind in the individual, and laying a snare for
the consciences of others to whom the example may
recommend itself.
This then is the first and chief business to be un
dertaken by every one, in order to the right study of
Systematic Theology. Here then I may propose for
your assistance, in carrying on such a study, (I am
speaking to the junior members of the University,) the
use of such works as Barrow and Pearson on the Creed,
and Burnet's Exposition of the Thirty-nine Articles.
For let it not be supposed that when I speak of
taking our system of theology, as stated in our formu
laries, in its simple and direct sense, and thus studying
it by the light of Scripture, I mean to exclude all
subordinate investigations of them, as unnecessary for
their due understanding. It is necessary, certainly,
that the history of the Articles should be particularly
inquired into.
Though in their fundamental nature all Articles
must be regarded in the light of a summary of
Christian truths, or compendious statement of the
main principles of Christian belief and conduct, yet
they are found to have been called forth by particular
occasions ; as our Articles were by the needs of the
Church at the time of the Reformation. And these
occasions consequently impress on them a peculiar
character ; giving them, as is the case with our Arti
cles, the form, for the most part, of a protest against

36
errors, and directing them to points of doctrine then
immediately brought into controversy.
Hence the history of the Reformation, and a study
of the controversies agitated at that time, are neces
sary for understanding the form which our Articles
have taken ; to know, that is, why they advert to
this or that point especially, and employ this or that
particular expression ; and this inquiry accordingly
must be superadded, in order to appreciate them
rightly. It is necessary, in fact, as an accompani
ment of the fundamental investigation of their nature,
as equivalents and representatives of the truths of
Scripture ; that we may study them throughout, both
as to their substance and form.
There are, indeed, four points of view under which
the Articles must be considered, in order to be fully
investigated : —
1. As a system of Theology, they aim at a pre
cision of statement beyond that of the Scriptures
themselves, and employ therefore peculiar or technical
terms ; that is, terms either invented for the purpose,
or taken from common use, and restricted to a peculiar
theological sense. It forms, therefore, a part of the
study of the Articles to investigate the nature of
these terms, to trace their origin, to investigate
their meaning, and illustrate their application to the
truth expressed by them. This is that branch of the
study of which I have attempted to execute a portion
in my Bampton Lectures.

37
2. As the Articles state particular truths, or deny
particular errors, it is necessary to be acquainted with
the history of the Church, and in particular with the
controversies agitated at the time of their formation,
and the circumstances under which they were framed
and ultimately left to the Church in their present
form, that we may have a just comprehension of their
character. " It is much to be regretted," says Archbishop
Laurence, " that those who have, either professedly
or incidentally, written upon our Articles, have not
bestowed that particular attention upon the history
of their compilation which the subject itself seems to
require, the scope of every attempt having rather
been to discover what construction peculiar expres
sions would admit, as applicable to the favourite con
troversies of a more recent period, than to determine
their sense by ascertaining the sources from which
they were primarily derived." '
On this department of the inquiry I would ear
nestly recommend to your attention the Bampton
Lectures of. Archbishop Laurence, to which I have
just referred. In these he shews, most convincingly,
how those particular Articles, which are by some
regarded as Calvinistic, were not in fact framed with
any view to the tenets or peculiar views of Calvin,
who had not at that time risen to the celebrity which
he afterwards attained ; but were expressly directed
' Bainpton Lectures, p. 30.

SS
against theories taught in the Church of Rome on
those points, and were founded in their mode of ex
pression on the suggestions and phraseology of the
most moderate of the Reformers — Melancthon. Our
Articles, in fact, when fully examined, will be found
to be strictly Protestant here as on other points ; and
the work of Archbishop Laurence tends, by its evi
dence, to establish the conclusion deducible from
other Articles, (more ostensibly Protestant in form
than those which are the subject of his work,) that
our Church can consistently have no agreement with
Rome in doctrine.
3. As, again, whatever may be their mode of ex
pression, or whatever their character as a code of
doctrine, they contain nothing but what may be either
read in Scripture or proved thereby, the inquiry still
remains as to their scriptural truth. It is further to
be shewn how they embody in their statements the
same truths which we read at large, and in their un
scientific form, in Scripture itself.
4. As the Articles are a test of sound doctrine in
those who are either employed in the ministry of the
Church, or admitted to certain privileges in its com
munion, and a symbol of Church-communion gene
rally to all members of the Church, it must further be
investigated what their nature is as a test and symbol
of religious profession, and what their obligations are
on us under this point of view.
Here come to be considered such questions as the

39
following : — Whether the Articles are to be regarded
as terms of agreement in doctrine, or merely as terms
of peace ; whether, that is, a person in accepting
them, or subscribing to them, affirms all the propo
sitions contained in them to be assented to by him,
or merely that he will not write or speak against
them ; — whether they may be assented to or sub
scribed with any reserve or qualification, — such as, so
far as they are agreeable to Scripture, or to the teach
ing of the Catholic Church.
The present times seem to demand that I should
more explicitly call your attention to this head.
If the principles be just which I have already ad
vanced in the former part of this Lecture, there will
be little difficulty to us in deciding on our views and
line of conduct, in regard to the several questions re
ferred to under this head.
If no extrinsic principles of interpretation are to
be admitted, it is plain that no subscription to the
Articles can be honest and true, which falls short of
an assent to the doctrines contained in them, or which
is made with any reservation.
With respect to the first question, whether the
Articles admit of being regarded as Articles of
peace, it can have no place, I think, with those
who are admitted to teach, either in the Univer
sity or in the Church. Agreeably to what I have
before stated, they appear to be set forth pri
marily, as guides and outlines to teachers of
Christian doctrine. And what absurdity and impro-

40
priety are there not in the supposition, that such
persons do not strictly assent to the propositions by
which their whole religious teaching is to be guided ?
They are, besides, expressly set forth for the avoiding
of diversities of opinion, and establishing true consent
in religion.
Then again, as to the second head of inquiry,
the mode of interpreting the act of subscribing
or accepting them. It is, undoubtedly, a very
right principle in itself, that nothing should be
received but what is agreeable to Scripture. But
this principle has no place, when we come to the
business of subscription. It has already had its place,
and you must be supposed to be satisfied that it does
apply, — that nothing has been admitted repugnant
to Scripture, or not capable of being supported, so far
as it is matter of doctrine, by Scripture reference, —
when you come to the signing of the Articles, or in
any way profess your acceptance of them. The case
is then inverted. You then take up the Articles as
your interpretation of Scripture — the interpretation,
that is, which, after investigation, you deliberately
approve — and you are not then entitled to return on
your former ground, and say, you approve the Ar
ticles, " so far as they agree with Scripture." For
the Articles are proposed to you, as giving the right
sense of the Scripture ; and you are supposed, when
you come to subscribe them, to have accepted them
as such. Thus Bishop Conybeare very justly ob
serves : " The Scripture is not to be here considered

41
as explicatory of the Articles, but our Articles as ex
plicatory of Scripture; and therefore the Church's
sense, in the Articles subscribed, is not to be deter
mined by considering Scripture, but her sense of
Scripture is to be determined by considering the Ar
ticles."1' No qualification therefore, no restriction is
to be admitted, in the act of subscription to the Ar
ticles, however drawn from pious considerations of
what is due to Scripture. They must then be in
terpreted by themselves, by the phraseology of the
Church, and a knowledge of its intention in drawing
them up and proposing them to its members.
What I have observed of the impropriety of sub
scribing the Articles with the reservation, " so far as
they are agreeable to Scripture," applies with equal,
nay greater force, to that other reservation, "so far
as they are agreeable to the teaching of the Catholic
Church." Both reservations are equally dishonest in
principle ; both are equally subversive of the use of
the Articles as a test of religious belief. But the
latter is more latitudinarian in extent than the former,
for it refers to no definite standard. The Scriptures
do present some definite standard, some limit to the
vagueness of interpretation, — wide as that limit is,
through the variety of discordant views of the sacred
text. But as for what is called the " Catholic sense,"
where is the limit to this ? The Romanist claims it
for his own Church. Some again claim it for the
* Sermon on Subscription, in Enchirid. Theol. vol. iii. p. 52 G.
G

42
Fathers of the fourth century. Some again regard
that as Catholic which excludes all peculiarities of
belief, — which includes every variety of religious pro
fession. Where then is any one standard to be found
like that of Scripture, to which the several interpre
tations, falling under these different notions of what
is Catholic, may ultimately be reduced ? The very
standard of reference is shadowy and uncertain. The
principle then is right in itself — that what is true in
doctrine is Catholic ; just as what is true in doctrine
is scriptural. But we must say of it, in like manner
as we observed of the Scripture-reference, that it has
no place here. The Articles are themselves the in
terpreters of what is Catholic. When we come to
subscribe them, we have decided that they are
Catholic. And (as in the other case) we have no
thing to consider at that point, but what is the true
meaning of the words and propositions, and what
the intention of the framers.
But I need scarcely enlarge further on this point,
as I may refer you to a Sermon of Dr. Elrington, the
Regius Professor of Divinity at Dublin, in which he
shews the identity of principle between those who
are now advocating a so-called catholic interpretation
of the Articles, and those who, sixty or seventy
years ago, petitioned for a relaxation from subscrip
tion, on the alleged ground that the Articles were
required to be signed in " such sense only wherein
they are agreeable to Scripture." The arguments of

43
both classes, he justly observes, " are precisely si
milar. Both assume a standard by which they are
to regulate their own opinion of the Article, and
both are equally ready to confess that the interpre
tation they adopt is not the obvious one to be derived
from the words of the formulary." ' " The answer
to both is the same," he adds. " The question is not
how far the Church follows Scripture or Tradition, or
how far she is guided in her interpretation, but what
is the sense she has affixed to Scripture." I would
recommend, however, the attentive perusal of this
Sermon to all present, — to the members especially of
my class.
In conclusion, it only remains for me to say, that
I am not calling others to a strictness which I do
not impose on myself. I trust I may confidently
appeal to the experience of myself, which I have
given during my occupation of this chair, now for a
period of more than six years, and to my whole con
duct in the administration of my office, that I have
faithfully and diligently taught the doctrines laid
down in our Articles as they are simply read, without
diminution or extenuation, or any accommodation
whatever. Without arrogance I feel that I can assert
this, for I am only setting forth my simple endeavour
to discharge a plain duty to the best of my ability.
I may appeal (and I say this not without serious
and humble thought of my own responsibility) to the
1 Serm. pp. 17, 18.

44
Searcher of hearts, whether I have not conscien
tiously laboured to approve myself as a Professor of
the true Scriptural faith taught by our Church, and
embodied in her formularies.
I have formed no party around me. I have not
studied to proselytize any. I have stood alone,
except so far as my teaching might associate me with
other members of our common faith and common
Church. Look to those by whom I am opposed.
There you see a compact body, understanding each
other, ready to act with each other, to join their names
and their hands at the first signal from their leaders.
Look to my case, on the other hand. I make no
boast of it ; for I have only acted in a way which my
feelings as well as my duty have led me. I have
quietly gone about the functions of my office. Some
may say I have been comparatively silent in it. But
I have not been silent in my place. Nor have I
shrunk from the labour and responsibility of pub
lishing what I thought proper from time to time
But I have formed no party. I have given no name
to any followers. Then, I pray you, test me by this
criterion, and test my adversaries too. And you
will then readily discern who are the disturbers of the
peace of the Church — who are the innovators — who
are the persons to be suspected and feared.
I would that you could call before you the many
hundreds of this University who have attended on
my Lectures during these six years, and ask them

what doctrine I had taught them. They would tell
you, I am sure, with one voice, (unless haply the
seductive spirit which is now so actively at work
among our junior members has drawn off any to par
tial, sectarian, miscalled Catholic views,) they would
tell you, that I have ever spoken to them with affec
tion and reverence of our own Church and all that
belongs to it ; that I have trained them, so far as I
had opportunity and means, in the paths of their fore
fathers in the faith — the reformers, and confessors, and
teachers of that pure branch of the Catholic Church
planted by God's providence and grace in this country.
I have courted no popularity by affected liberality.
I have not presumed to give away God's truth, over
which I had no liberty — no power, but one simply of
custody, and stewardship, and dispensation to the
household of Christ. I have certainly indulged cha
ritable sentiments towards those who differ from us,
however widely. I have not construed the Scripture
so as to justify me in hating those who hold a different
creed, as if they were necessarily haters of God. But
I have not been liberal out of that which is not mine
to give away. I have not confounded the notion
of sincerity in the individual with the attainment of
Trutli. And in conceding, accordingly, the merit of
integrity of motive to those who profess to have con
scientiously sought the truth and yet missed it, I
have not conceded the truth itself. I have held fast,
and have encouraged others to hold fast, the one

46
faith delivered to the saints, the one truth consigned
to the Scriptures. I have in no sense been the ad
vocate of indifferentism, or lost sight of the oneness
of truth. It is true, that I have not ceased to warn those
whom I have addressed against the Romanist ten
dencies of principles now so boldly propagated, both
within and without this University, in spite of the au
thoritative censure of them, both by the governing body
of the University and several Bishops of the Church.
And I ought not to wonder therefore that the authors
and abettors of the Tracts for the Times should be dis
quieted and uneasy with regard to me. It is, perhaps,
only part of the common infirmity of human nature that
they should wish to disparage me in my office, instead
of meeting me fairly in the field ; that they should
passionately deprecate the untying of the band which
their artifices twined around me, or rather round a
branch of my office, in 1836, and leave me rather to
act at a disadvantage, as they may think, against
them. This is not to be wondered at. I am honoured
so far by their opposition, though I regret it on their
account, — deeply regret it on account of the University
and the Church. I certainly have opposed what have
now obtained the name of Tractarian views ; and
shall still oppose them, — I mean in the field of argu
ment and of truth, — and with the weapons proper to
such a contest, — so long as they continue to infest the
Church. It is not that I accuse this party so much of

47
carrying our Church over to Rome, as of bringing
the principles of the Church of Rome into our own.
It is not the desertion of a regiment, or of an army,
to the enemy, that is so formidable, as a civil war
among the people, or the revolutionizing of a whole
population. The Lacedaemonians, in their contentions
with Athens, cared little for the conquest of some
particular city, if they could only introduce into it
a mode of government, eVtT^SeiW a-cpia-iv avrolc;, con
formable to their own polity. And the introduction
of such alien principles was the sure prelude to the
alienation of the people. If our Church be leavened
with Romanist principles, there will be little need to
the enemy of any actual transition into their camp.
But in opposing them, I am not opposing Catholic
truth, but upholding it. I am defending the Catholic
truth, inherited from our immediate fathers in the
faith, the Reformers of our Church, and, through
them, from the Apostles themselves. They have
chosen to take up some of the worst corruptions
of Romanism, paring away their glaring deformi
ties, and to stamp these with the name of Catho
licity ; and then endeavoured to maintain their po
sition in the Church, by arguing the approximation
of our Articles to the Decrees of Trent. Against
so un-catholic, so insincere a method of teaching,
I shall ever strenuously contend. And I must
expect therefore to encounter the hostility of an
ambitious aspiring party in the Church — a party

48
now fostered into considerable strength by the too
indulgent regard which they for a long time ob
tained, and the officious praises heaped on them by
themselves and others, — but not strong enough yet, I
trust, to overpower the sincere part of the Church or
the University, though they may distract both for a
considerable time.
But though I may look for the censures and
opposition of this party, I have certainly no little
reason to hope for a more patient judgment now, than
perhaps was possible on a former occasion, from the
unprejudiced, and still Protestant members of the
Church. To them I earnestly propose a calm consideration
of my whole conduct since my appointment to this
chair. I ask them only to retrace for themselves
what I have done, not to take their estimate of me
from the studied representations of those who are
and must be opposed to me. On such I may make
the call to believe me; to read, if it were only the
Sermons that I not long ago delivered before the
University and have since published, and lay their
hands on their hearts and say, whether those are the
writings of one who does not sincerely hold the great
doctrines of the Gospel, and who does not conscien
tiously labour to enforce them on others. I ask such
to cast away all previous misconceptions ; to make
allowance for former excitement ; to fix their eye, not
on what the invidious and censorious may hold up to

49
them as objectionable, but on what I have always
really intended, and what, I confidently trust, will ever
be my intention ; namely, conscientiously to profess
and to " minister the doctrine and sacraments and dis
cipline of Christ, as the Lord hath commanded, and
this Church and realm hath ever received the same."m
What avails it, that an ingenious disputant
may, by artificial parallelisms, display an apparent in
consistency in any one's writings. What if he may
isolate a passage from my writings, pointing it with
his own conceits, with the help of his italics and
startling objections ; am I to be judged by another
man's ingenuity, or folly, or spleen ? and not by my
own declaration of my intention ? There are none so
dull, it is said, as those who will not understand. It
may be impossible to convince such persons of error,
because they proceeded on no conviction of the un
derstanding, but only on the will to do wrong to one's
meaning. But it is too hard upon an author to judge
him by the perverse dulness of his interpreter, where
he is at hand to deny the interpretation ; as I am here,
now utterly to disclaim the folly and heterodoxy of
ray interpreter. And what must be the iniquity of a
person to persevere in such interpretations, when he
is positively told that he is wrong, and those inter
pretations are disclaimed ?
And as to shewing forth an appearance of incon
sistency, may not this be done in any case almost ?
™ Ordination Service. H

50
Might not the infidel practise this delusion even in
regard to the Scriptures themselves ? Has not, in fact,
one of the Tractarian writers drawn together a number
of passages of Scripture, and called on the reader to
observe the " startling" character of the quotations ? n
For my part, I am not over-anxious about the plea of
consistency. Consistency in itself, further than it is
consistency in right, is of no value. If I have any
where said what is wrong, I disclaim it now. If I
have said what is right, I maintain it, though it may
be made to appear wrong by those with whose views
it may not accord.
Such is the equitable consideration with which I
may well believe I have been regarded by the pre
siding body of the University, who, in their concern
for the interests of the University and the wellbeing
of its particular members, have brought before you
the recent measures ; both the Statutes relative to
the establishment of the additional Lectures and the
Examinations in Theology, and that shortly to be
submitted to Convocation. They have valued truth
and right, and peace and kindness, I may say without
flattery, above other considerations, above all party
spirit, above all sinister constructions and imputa
tions. I ask the candid only to follow the example
thus set them by the highest authorities in the Uni
versity. I ask them only to believe, as these authori
ties have done, my own declaration of my firm attach-
" Tracts for the Times.

ment to Articles which I have subscribed, rather than
the insulting representations of my opinions by my ad
versaries. I ask them only to inquire, as they appear
to have done, into the evidence of six years' labour in
my office, rather than to rest on the suborned evidence
supplied by a rankling inveteracy which, most unhappy
to think! not even the lapse of years can soften.
Would that myself, would that all of us here
present, might as fully exemplify, in all our pro
ceedings, in all that we do and say, our conscientious
profession of the doctrines contained in our Articles.
Would that those who are now so clamorous in
exacting every expression of mine to their own
standard, — abandoning their Catholic criterion when
it suits their purpose, and substituting for it an here
tical medium of vision, — had not set the evil example
to the University of paltering with the sense of the
Articles, — of tempting others to subscribe to them
in a way by which, according to the words of our
Diocesan, in his recent Charge, " the Articles may
be made to mean any thing or nothing."0 God
keep me, God keep us all from this double-dealing,
this secret discipline of reserve, this esoteric doctrine
of subscription. It is nothing to be wondered at,
indeed, that they should suspect another's sincerity,
and seek a person's meaning, rather from artful con
structions than from direct statements, who have
countenanced by their expositions the utmost laxity
• Bi-liup of Oxtin.l's Charge, p. 18.

52
of interpretation of the Articles and of subscription
to them.
But you, my fellow students, and pupils in Theo
logy, remember that I have not taught you by my
Lectures, or encouraged you by my example, so to
learn and profess the doctrine of Christ. I have ex
horted, and now exhort you, to be single-hearted in
your profession — to look neither to the right hand or
to the left — to inquire simply what the Articles mean
— to cast to the wind all ingenious glosses and refine
ments in their exposition — and thus to receive and
apply to your understanding of the Scriptures and
edification in all Christian graces, the whole counsel
of God set forth in them : " Hold fast therefore the
form of sound words ; in faith and love which is in
Christ Jesus." " Hold fast the profession of your
faith without wavering;" knowing that "a double-
minded man is unstable in all his ways." " Continue in
the things which you have learned and been assured
of, knowing of whom you have heard them : " and
that " from children," under the guidance of a tender
and watchful mother in Christ, the Church of Eng
land, you "have known the Holy Scriptures," and
been taught to regard them as "able to make you wise
unto salvation, through faith which is in Christ
Jesus."