Quotations from Newman's Writings

Here are quotations on a few subjects (quotations on many more subjects are included in the free eBook): Truth, Dogma Church, Apostolic Private Judgment Church Scandal Conscience Conversion Faith and Reason Faith and Politics Saints

Truth, Dogma

[From letter to W G Ward, who had written to Newman about the 'keen and constant pleasure' afforded by intellectual processes, 15 March 1862] I recollect a friend asked me, soon after writing my volume on Justification, whether it was not interesting to write; and my answer was that it was the painful relieving of an irritation, as a man might go to a dentist, not for 'keen and constant pleasure,' but with the mingled satisfaction and distress of being rid of pain by pain ... What has been my own motive-cause in writing may be that of others,—the sight of a truth, and the desire to show it to others. Letters and Diaries, Volume 20, Jul 1861 to Dec 1863, p 169 {2} [From letter to A J Hanmer, 10 February 1848] Most people know in a measure what I gave up to become a Catholic, and they can fancy that probably it was much more than they happen to know, yet were the loss a hundred-fold, it would indeed have been a cheap bargain. It is coming out of shadows into truth ... Letters and Diaries, Volume 12, Jan 1847 to Dec 1848, p 168 [Emphasis added. Compare this to Newman's epitaph: 'Ex umbris et imaginibus in veritatem.'] {3} I have changed in many things: in this I have not. From the age of fifteen, dogma has been the fundamental principle of my religion: I know no other religion; I cannot enter into the idea of any other sort of religion; religion, as a mere sentiment, is to me a dream and a mockery. As well can there be filial love without the fact of a father, as devotion without the fact of a Supreme Being. What I held in 1816, I held in 1833, and I hold in 1864. Please God, I shall hold it to the end. Apologia, Chapter 2, p 49 {4} [From letter to Lady Chatterton, 29 March 1866] You speak as if what is pleasant to the feelings must be true; and that what is true must be pleasant. But this is not so. The idea of Purgatory, as you say, is not pleasant, but that does not prove it is not true; and, if it be true, as the Catholic Church teaches, it will not save us from it hereafter, that we felt it painful to think upon here. And so of other doctrines. Letters and Diaries, Volume 22, Jul 1865 to Dec 1866, p 194 {5} The definition of scepticism to which I am myself accustomed is such as this: 'Scepticism is the system which holds that no certainty is attainable, as not in other things so not in questions of religious truth and error.' How have I incurred this reproach? On the contrary, I have not only asserted, with a strength of words which has sometimes incurred censure, my belief in religious truth, but have insisted on the certainty of such truth, and on Certitude as having a place among the constituents of human thought … Stray Essays on Controversial Points variously illustrated, by Cardinal Newman, 1890, privately printed, p 92 {6} By Objective Truth is meant the Religious System considered as existing in itself, external to this or that particular mind; by Subjective, is meant that which each mind receives in particular, and considers to be such. To believe in Objective Truth is to throw ourselves forward upon that which we have but partially mastered or made subjective; to embrace, maintain, and use general propositions which are larger than our own capacity, of which we cannot see the bottom, which we cannot follow out into their multiform details; to come before and bow before the import of such propositions, as if we were contemplating what is real and independent of human judgment. Such a belief, implicit, and symbolized as it is in the use of creeds, seems to the Rationalist superstitious and unmeaning, and he consequently confines Faith to the province of Subjective Truth, or to the reception of doctrine, as, and so far as, it is met and apprehended by the mind, which will be differently, as he considers, in different persons … That is, he professes to believe in that which he opines … I repeat, he owns that Faith, viewed with reference to its objects, is never more than an opinion, and is pleasing to God, not as an active principle apprehending definite doctrines, but as a result and fruit, and therefore an evidence of past diligence, independent inquiry, dispassionateness, and the like. Essays Critical and Historical, Volume 1, Essay II. Introduction of rationalistic principles into Revealed Religion (Tract 73), pp 34-35 {7} … let us honestly confess what is certain, that not the ignorant, or weakminded, or dull, or enthusiastic, or extravagant only turn their ears from the Truth and are turned unto fables, but also men of powerful minds, keen perceptions, extended views, ample and various knowledge. Let us, I say, confess it; yet let us not believe in the Truth the less on account of it. I say that in the number of the adversaries of the Truth, there are many men of highly endowed and highly cultivated minds. Why should we deny this? ... What is called ability and talent does not make a man a Christian; nay, often, as may be shown without difficulty, it is the occasion of his rejecting Christianity, or this or that part of it ... Does not our Saviour Himself say the same thing, when He thanks His Father, Lord of heaven and earth, that He hath hid these things from the wise and prudent, and revealed them unto babes? Parochial and Plain Sermons, Volume 8, Sermon 13. Truth Hidden when not Sought After, pp 186-188 {8} … is not this the error, the common and fatal error, of the world, to think itself a judge of Religious Truth without preparation of heart? 'I am the good Shepherd, and know My sheep, and am known of Mine.' … 'The pure in heart shall see God' … 'The darkness comprehendeth it not.' Gross eyes see not; heavy ears hear not. Oxford University Sermons, Sermon 10. Faith and Reason Contrasted as Habits of Mind, p 198 {9} [From letter to Charles Robert Newman, his brother, 3 March 1825] Alas, how many have been overset by certain fancies, that they had discovered new principles. Do not suppose yourself the first who has imagined truth hid almost from the whole world till he detected it. Fresh theories of morals and religion are no uncommon thing; every projector flatters himself that now at last he has hit the mark; yet in time the bubbles break and vanish: thus whether your theory be a bubble or not, you have no right to feel confident in its truth from its being different from any theory yet invented. Letters and Diaries, Volume 1, Feb 1801 to Dec 1826, Oriel, p 214 {10} That there is a truth then; that there is one truth; that religious error is in itself of an immoral nature; that its maintainers, unless involuntarily such, are guilty in maintaining it; that it is to be dreaded; that the search for truth is not the gratification of curiosity; … that the mind is below truth, not above it, and is bound, not to descant upon it, but to venerate it; that truth and falsehood are set before us for the trial of our hearts; that our choice is an awful giving forth of lots on which salvation or rejection is inscribed; that 'before all things it is necessary to hold the Catholic faith' … this is the dogmatical principle, which has strength. Development of Christian Doctrine, Chapter 8, p 357 {11} There can be no combination on the basis of truth without an organ of truth ... If Christianity is both social and dogmatic, and intended for all ages, it must humanly speaking have an infallible expounder. Development of Christian Doctrine, Chapter 2, p 90 {12} … if it is the duty of the Church to act as 'the pillar and ground of the Truth,' [1 Tim. 3:15] she is manifestly obliged from time to time, and to the end of time, to denounce opinions incompatible with that truth, whenever able and subtle minds in her communion venture to publish such opinions. Grammar of Assent, Chapter 5, Section 2, p 149 {13} The world is a rough antagonist of spiritual truth: sometimes with mailed hand, sometimes with pertinacious logic, sometimes with a storm of irresistible facts, it presses on against you. What it says is true perhaps as far as it goes, but it is not the whole truth, or the most important truth. These more important truths, which the natural heart admits in their substance, though it cannot maintain,—the being of a God, the certainty of future retribution, the claims of the moral law, the reality of sin, the hope of supernatural help,—of these the Church is in matter of fact the undaunted and the only defender. Idea of a University, Chapter 10. Christianity and Medical Science, p 516 {14} It is not God's way that great blessings should descend without the sacrifice first of great sufferings. If the truth is to be spread to any wide extent among this people, how can we dream, how can we hope, that trial and trouble shall not accompany its going forth? Sermons Preached on Various Occasions, Sermon 10. The Second Spring, p 178 [Preached 13 July 1852] {15} … do but examine your thoughts and doings; do but attempt what you know to be God's will, and you will most assuredly be led on into all the truth: you will recognize the force, meaning, and awful graciousness of the Gospel Creed; you will bear witness to the truth of one doctrine, by your own past experience of yourselves; of another, by seeing that it is suited to your necessity; of a third, by finding it fulfilled upon your obeying it. As the prophet says, 'Bring ye' your offering 'into Mine house,' saith the Lord, 'and prove Me now herewith, if I will not open you the windows of heaven, and pour you out a blessing that there shall not be room enough to receive it.' [Mal. iii. 10.] Parochial and Plain Sermons, Volume 8, Sermon 8. Inward Witness to the Truth of the Gospel, p 120 [Quoted by Pope Saint John Paul II on centenary of Newman's death] {16} When I would search the truths that in me burn, And mould them into rule and argument, A hundred reasoners cried,— 'Hast thou to learn Those dreams are scatter'd now, those fires are spent?' And, did I mount to simpler thoughts, and try Some theme of peace, 'twas still the same reply. Perplex'd, I hoped my heart was pure of guile, But judged me weak in wit, to disagree; But now, I see that men are mad awhile, 'Tis the old history—Truth without a home, Despised and slain, then rising from the tomb. Verses on Various Occasions, 85. The Age to Come, p 148 {17} To one other authority I appeal on this subject, which commands from me attention of a special kind, for they are the words of a Father. It will serve to bring my work to a conclusion. 'St. Philip,' says the Roman Oratorian who wrote his Life, 'had a particular dislike of affectation both in himself and others, in speaking, in dressing, or in anything else ... he avoided, as much as possible, having anything to do with two-faced persons, who did not go simply and straightforwardly to work in their transactions. As for liars, he could not endure them, and he was continually reminding his spiritual children, to avoid them as they would a pestilence.' These are the principles on which I have acted before I was a Catholic; these are the principles which, I trust, will be my stay and guidance to the end. Apologia, Chapter 5, p 282 [Reference to St. Philip Neri, founder of the Oratory in Rome; Newman founded the Oratory in England] Top of page

Church, Apostolic

If Christ has constituted one Holy Society (which He has done); if His Apostles have set it in order (which they did), and have expressly bidden us (as they have in Scripture) not to undo what they have begun; and if (in matter of fact) their Work so set in order and so blessed is among us this very day (as it is), and we partakers of it, it were a traitor's act in us to abandon it, an unthankful slight on those who have preserved it for so many ages, a cruel disregard of those who are to come after us, nay of those now alive who are external to it and might otherwise be brought into it. We must transmit as we have received. We did not make the Church; we may not unmake it. Parochial and Plain Sermons, Volume 3, Sermon 14. Submission to Church Authority, p 202 {2} Immediate, implicit submission of the mind was, in the lifetime of the Apostles, the only, the necessary token of faith; then there was no room whatever for what is now called private judgment. No one could say: 'I will choose my religion for myself, I will believe this, I will not believe that; I will pledge myself to nothing; I will believe just as long as I please, and no longer; what I believe to-day I will reject tomorrow, if I choose. I will believe what the Apostles have as yet said, but I will not believe what they shall say in time to come.' No; either the Apostles were from God, or they were not; if they were, everything that they preached was to be believed by their hearers; if they were not, there was nothing for their hearers to believe. Discourses to Mixed Congregations, Discourse 10. Faith and Private Judgment, p 197 {3} [From letter to Mrs. William Robinson Clark, a prospective convert, 31 December 1875] The chief point I should wish to impress upon you, and direct you to pray for, is a clear faith that the Church in communion with Rome is that Church which the Apostles began at Pentecost, that Church which St. Paul calls the Pillar and ground of the Truth, that Church of which St. Luke says 'The Lord added to the Church such as should be saved.' [1 Timothy 3:15, Acts 2:47 (KJV)] Letters and Diaries, Volume 27, Jan 1874 to Dec 1875, p 397 {4} The Gospel faith has not been left to the world at large, recorded indeed in the Bible, but there left, like other important truths, to be taken up by men or rejected, as it may happen. Truths, indeed, in science and the arts have been thus left to the chance adoption or neglect of mankind … But for the more momentous truths of revealed religion, the God, who wrought by human means in their first introduction, still preserves them by the same. Christ formed a body; He secured that body from dissolution by the bond of a Sacrament. He committed the privileges of His spiritual kingdom and the maintenance of His faith as a legacy to this baptized society; and into it, as a matter of historical fact, all the nations have flowed. Christianity has not been spread, as other systems, in an isolated manner, or by books; but from a centre, by regularly formed bodies, descendants of the three thousand, who, after St. Peter's preaching on the day of Pentecost, joined themselves to the Apostles' doctrine and fellowship. Parochial and Plain Sermons, Volume 7, Sermon 17. The Unity of the Church, pp 236-237 {5} Now it is very intelligible to deny that there is any divinely established, divinely commissioned, Church at all; but to hold that the one Church is realized and perfected in each of a thousand independent corporate units, co-ordinate, bound by no necessary intercommunion, adjusted into no divine organized whole, is a tenet, not merely unknown to Scripture, but so plainly impossible to carry out practically, as to make it clear that it never would have been devised, except by men, who conscientiously believing in a visible Church and also conscientiously opposed to Rome, had nothing left for them, whether they would or would not, but to entrench themselves in the paradox, that the Church was one indeed, and the Church was Catholic indeed, but that the one Church was not the Catholic, and the Catholic Church was not the one. Essays Critical and Historical, Volume 2, Note on Essay X, p 91 {6} Coming to you then from the very time of the Apostles, spreading out into all lands, triumphing over a thousand revolutions, exhibiting so awful a unity, glorying in so mysterious a vitality, so majestic, so imperturbable, so bold, so saintly, so sublime, so beautiful, O ye sons of men, can ye doubt that she is the Divine Messenger for whom you seek? Discourses to Mixed Congregations, Discourse 13. Mysteries of Nature and of Grace, p 281 {7} Since Apostolic faith was in the beginning reliance on man's word, as being God's word, since what faith was then such it is now, since faith is necessary for salvation, let them attempt to exercise it towards another, if they will not accept the Bride of the Lamb. Let them, if they can, put faith in some of those religions which have lasted a whole two or three centuries in a corner of the earth. Let them stake their eternal prospects on kings and nobles and parliaments and soldiery, let them take some mere fiction of the law, or abortion of the schools, or idol of a populace, or upstart of a crisis, or oracle of lecture-rooms, as the prophet of God. Alas! they are hardly bestead if they must possess a virtue, which they have no means of exercising,—if they must make an act of faith, they know not on whom, and know not why! Discourses to Mixed Congregations, Discourse 10. Faith and Private Judgment, p 211 {8} … to what does the Church oblige us? and what is her warrant for doing so? I answer, The matters which she can oblige us to accept with an internal assent are the matters contained in that Revelation of Truth, written or unwritten, which came to the world from our Lord and His Apostles; and this claim on our faith in her decisions as to the matter of that Revelation rests on her being the divinely appointed representative of the Apostles and the expounder of their words; so that whatever she categorically delivers about their formal acts or their writings or their teaching, is an Apostolic deliverance. I repeat, the only sense in which the Church 'insists' on any statement, Biblical or other, the only reason of her so insisting, is that that statement is part of the original Revelation, and therefore must be unconditionally accepted,—else, that Revelation is not, as a revelation, accepted at all. "On the Inspiration of Scripture," The Nineteenth Century, Vol. 15, No. 84, Feb. 1884, p 186 {9} [From letter to Richard Holt Hutton, 20 October 1871] A Catholic believes that the Church is, so to call it, a standing Apostolic committee—to answer questions, which the Apostles are not here to answer, concerning what they received and preached. As the Church does not know more than the Apostles knew, there are many questions which the Church cannot answer—but it can put before us clearly, what the Apostles (being in heaven) cannot, what their doctrine is, what is to be believed, and what is not such. Letters and Diaries, Volume 25, Jan 1870 to Dec 187l, p 418 {10} I adore Thee, O my Lord, the Third Person of the All-Blessed Trinity, that Thou hast set up in this world of sin a great light upon a hill. Thou hast founded the Church, Thou hast established and maintained it. Thou fillest it continually with Thy gifts, that men may see, and draw near, and take, and live. Meditations and Devotions, Part III, XIV. The Paraclete, p 398 {11} The Apostles lived eighteen hundred years since; and as far as the Christian looks back, so far can he afford to look forward. There is one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all, from first to last. Parochial and Plain Sermons, Volume 3, Sermon 17. The Visible Church an Encouragement to Faith, p 250 Top of page

Private Judgment

There is this obvious, undeniable difficulty in the attempt to form a theory of Private Judgment, in the choice of a religion, that Private Judgment leads different minds in such different directions. If, indeed, there be no religious truth, or at least no sufficient means of arriving at it, then the difficulty vanishes: for where there is nothing to find, there can be no rules for seeking, and contradiction in the result is but a reductio ad absurdum of the attempt. Essays Critical and Historical, Volume 2, XIV. Private Judgment, p 336 {2} Poor wand'rers, ye are sore distress'd To find that path which Christ has bless'd, Track'd by His saintly throng; Each claims to trust his own weak will, Blind idol!—so ye languish still, All wranglers and all wrong. Verses on Various Occasions, 35. Private Judgment, p 78 (1832) {3} We say, then, to men of the day, Take Christianity, or leave it; do not practise upon it; to do so is as unphilosophical as it is dangerous. Do not attempt to halve a spiritual unit. You are apt to call it a dishonesty in us to refuse to follow out our reasonings, when faith stands in the way; is there no intellectual dishonesty in your self-trust? First, your very accusation of us is dishonest; for you keep in the background the circumstance, of which you are well aware, that such a refusal on our part to back Reason against Faith, is the necessary consequence of our accepting an authoritative Revelation; and next you profess to accept that Revelation yourselves, whilst you dishonestly pick and choose, and take as much or as little of it as you please. You either accept Christianity, or you do not: if you do, do not garble and patch it; if you do not, suffer others to submit to it ungarbled. Discussions and Arguments, VI. An Internal Argument for Christianity, p 398 {4} If a staunch Protestant's daughter turns Roman, and betakes herself to a convent, why does he not exult in the occurrence? Why does he not give a public breakfast, or hold a meeting, or erect a memorial, or write a pamphlet in honour of her, and of the great undying principle she has so gloriously vindicated? Why is he in this base, disloyal style muttering about priests, and Jesuits, and the horrors of nunneries, in solution of the phenomenon, when he has the fair and ample form of Private Judgment rising before his eyes, and pleading with him, and bidding him impute good motives, not bad, and in very charity ascribe to the influence of a high and holy principle, to a right and a duty of every member of the family of man, what his poor human instincts are fain to set down as a folly or a sin. All this would lead us to suspect that the doctrine of private judgment, in its simplicity, purity, and integrity,—private judgment, all private judgment, and nothing but private judgment,—is held by very few persons indeed; and that the great mass of the population are either stark unbelievers in it, or deplorably dark about it; and that even the minority who are in a manner faithful to it, have glossed and corrupted the true sense of it by a miserably faulty reading, and hold, not the right of private judgment, but the private right of judgment; in other words, their own private right, and no one's else. Essays Critical and Historical, Volume 2, XIV. Private Judgment, pp 340-341 {5} And here we see what is meant when a person says that the Catholic system comes home to his mind, fulfils his ideas of religion, satisfies his sympathies, and the like; and thereupon becomes a Catholic. Such a person is often said to go by private judgment, to be choosing his religion by his own standard of what a religion ought to be. Now it need not be denied that those who are external to the Church must begin with private judgment; they use it in order ultimately to supersede it; as a man out of doors uses a lamp in a dark night, and puts it out when he gets home ... There is no absurdity, then, or inconsistency in a person first using his private judgment and then denouncing its use. Circumstances change duties. Loss and Gain, Chapter 2-6, pp 203-204 {6} [From letter to Mrs. Helbert, 30 August 1869] There are very false opinions about the Catholic Church—it is thought it does not allow of private judgment, but it allows of a great deal—and this is the reason you are perplexed by hearing different Catholics say different things. If you want to know what we believe, go to our standard authoritative books—if you wish to hear what individuals think, go to pamphlets, reviews, and the like … When a man is perplexed by a difference between different teachers, if he cannot solve the difficulty at once, it his duty to say 'I believe what the Church holds and teaches.' He cannot go wrong in that … Letters and Diaries, Volume 24, Jan 1868 to Dec 1869, p 324 {7} Yet after all, which is the more likely to be right,—he who has given years, perhaps, to the search of truth, who has habitually prayed for guidance, and has taken all the means in his power to secure it, or they, 'the gentlemen of England who sit at home at ease'? No, no, they may talk of seeking the truth, of private judgment, as a duty, but they have never sought, they have never judged; they are where they are, not because it is true, but because they find themselves there, because it is their 'providential position,' and a pleasant one into the bargain. Loss and Gain, Chapter 3-5, p 369 Top of page

Church Scandal

Do not think I am speaking of one or two men, when I speak of the scandal which a Christian's inconsistency brings upon his cause. The Christian world, so called, what is it practically, but a witness for Satan rather than a witness for Christ? Rightly understood, doubtless the very disobedience of Christians witnesses for Him who will overcome whenever He is judged. But is there any antecedent prejudice against religion so great as that which is occasioned by the lives of its professors? Let us ever remember, that all who follow God with but a half heart, strengthen the hands of His enemies, give cause of exultation to wicked men, perplex inquirers after truth, and bring reproach upon their Saviour's name. Parochial and Plain Sermons, Volume 1, Sermon 10. Profession without Practice, p 136 {2} ... It is not what the Catholic Church imposes, but what human nature prompts, which leads any portion of her ecclesiastics into sin. Human nature will break out, like some wild and raging element, under any system; it bursts out under the Protestant system; it bursts out under the Catholic; passion will carry away the married clergyman as well as the unmarried priest ... It is the world, the flesh, and the devil, not celibacy, which is the ruin of those who fall. Present Position of Catholics in England, Lecture 4, p 136 {3} My Brethren, she has scandals, she has a reproach, she has a shame: no Catholic will deny it. She has ever had the reproach and shame of being the mother of children unworthy of her. She has good children;—she has many more bad. Such is the will of God, as declared from the beginning. He might have formed a pure Church; but He has expressly predicted that the cockle, sown by the enemy, shall remain with the wheat, even to the harvest at the end of the world. He pronounced that His Church should be like a fisher's net, gathering of every kind, and not examined till the evening. Nay, more than this, He declared that the bad and imperfect should far surpass the good. 'Many are called,' He said, 'but few are chosen'; … There is ever, then, an abundance of materials in the lives and the histories of Catholics; ready to the use of those opponents who, starting with the notion that the Holy Church is the work of the devil, wish to have some corroboration of their leading idea. Her very prerogative gives special opportunity for it; I mean, that she is the Church of all lands and of all times. If there was a Judas among the Apostles, … why should we be surprised that in the course of eighteen hundred years, there should be flagrant instances of cruelty, of unfaithfulness, of hypocrisy, or of profligacy, and that not only in the Catholic people, but in high places, in royal palaces, in bishops' households, nay, in the seat of St. Peter itself? Sermons Preached on Various Occasions, Sermon 9-2. Christ upon the Waters—Part 2, pp 144- 145 {4} [From letter to Mrs Helbert, 10 September 1869] As to the scandalous lives of some Popes, to which you refer, we not only allow but glory in, as showing the Divine Care of the Church, that, even in the case of those very men, the See of Peter spoke truth, not falsehood—As in Balaam, as in Eli, as in Caiaphas, as in Judas, God was glorified, so has He been glorified, in that respect in which the Pope is His appointed teacher, in Alexander VI and Leo Tenth. Letters and Diaries, Volume 24, Jan 1868 to Dec 1869, pp 328-329 {5} [From letter to John Rickards Mozley, son of Newman's sister Jemima, 21 April 1875] You now ask me whether I agree or disagree with your judgment 'that the Church of Rome, as a society, has sometimes done, more often sanctioned, actions, which were wrong and injurious to mankind.' I find no difficulty in answering you. I should say that the Church has two sides, a human and a divine, and that everything that is human is liable to error. Whether, so considered, it has in matter of fact erred must be determined by history, and, for the very reason that it is human as well as divine, I am disposed to believe it has, even before the fact has been proved to me from history ... I have no difficulty in supposing that Popes have erred, or Councils have erred, or populations have erred, in human aspects, because, as St. Paul says, 'We have this treasure in earthly vessels,' speaking of the Apostles themselves. No one is impeccable, and no collection of men. Letters and Diaries, Volume 27, Jan 1874 to Dec 1875, pp 282-283 {6} … that temporal prosperity should frequently be withheld from the Church, that she should be often hated and despised, that she should be defaced by 'spot and wrinkle,' that she should be to many a stumbling-block,—all this seems to me nothing more than what we might be led to expect. 1st. Because she is the body of a Head crowned with thorns. Letters and Diaries, Volume 19, Jan 1859 to Jun 1861, Appendix, p 540 ('Temporal Prosperity, whether a Note of the Church,' Rambler, July 1859) {7} In beginning to speak of the Vatican Council, I am obliged from circumstances to begin by speaking of myself. The most unfounded and erroneous assertions have publicly been made about my sentiments towards it, and as confidently as they are unfounded … the explanation of such reports about me is easy. They arise from forgetfulness on the part of those who spread them, that there are two sides of ecclesiastical acts, that right ends are often prosecuted by very unworthy means, and that in consequence those who, like myself, oppose a line of action, are not necessarily opposed to the issue for which it has been adopted. Jacob gained by wrong means his destined blessing. "All are not Israelites, who are of Israel," and there are partisans of Rome who have not the sanctity and wisdom of Rome herself. Anglican Difficulties, Volume 2, Letter to the Duke of Norfolk, Section 8, The Vatican Council, pp 299-300 {8} A people's religion is ever a corrupt religion, in spite of the provisions of Holy Church. If she is to be Catholic, you must admit within her net fish of every kind, guests good and had, vessels of gold, vessels of earth. You may beat religion out of men, if you will, and then their excesses will take a different direction; but if you make use of religion to improve them, they will make use of religion to corrupt it. And then you will have effected that compromise of which our countrymen report so unfavourably from abroad:—a high grand faith and worship which compels their admiration, and puerile absurdities among the people which excite their contempt. Anglican Difficulties, Volume 2, Letter to Pusey, 4. Belief of Catholics concerning the Blessed Virgin, as coloured by their Devotion to her, p 81 {9} … a poor Neapolitan crone, who chatters to the crucifix, refers that crucifix in her deep mental consciousness to an original who once hung upon a cross in flesh and blood; but if, nevertheless she is puzzle-headed enough to assign virtue to it in itself, she does no more than the woman in the Gospel, who preferred to rely for a cure on a bit of cloth, which was our Lord's, to directly and honestly addressing Him [Mark 5: 28]. Yet He praised her before the multitude, praised her for what might, not without reason, be called an idolatrous act; for in His new law He was opening the meaning of the word 'idolatry,' and applying it to various sins, to the adoration paid to rich men, to the thirst after gain, to ambition, and the pride of life, idolatries worse in His judgment than the idolatry of ignorance, but not commonly startling or shocking to educated minds. Via Media, Volume 1, Preface to the Third Edition, p lxviii {10} … in truth the whole course of Christianity from the first, when we come to examine it, is but one series of troubles and disorders. Every century is like every other, and to those who live in it seems worse than all times before it. The Church is ever ailing, and lingers on in weakness, 'always bearing about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus, that the life also of Jesus might be made manifest in her body.' Religion seems ever expiring, schisms dominant, the light of Truth dim, its adherents scattered. The cause of Christ is ever in its last agony, as though it were but a question of time whether it fails finally this day or another ... Such is God's will, gathering in His elect, first one and then another, by little and little, in the intervals of sunshine between storm and storm, or snatching them from the surge of evil, even when the waters rage most furiously ... God alone knows the day and the hour when that will at length be, which He is ever threatening; meanwhile, thus much of comfort do we gain from what has been hitherto,—not to despond, not to be dismayed, not to be anxious, at the troubles which encompass us. They have ever been; they ever shall be; they are our portion. Via Media, Volume 1, Lecture 14. On the Fortunes of the Church, pp 354-355 Top of page

Conscience

What is the main guide of the soul, given to the whole race of Adam, outside the true fold of Christ as well as within it, given from the first dawn of reason, given to it in spite of that grievous penalty of ignorance, which is one of the chief miseries of our fallen state? It is the light of conscience, 'the true Light,' as the … Evangelist says, … 'which enlighteneth every man that cometh into this world.' [John 1:9] Sermons Preached on Various Occasions, Sermon 5. Dispositions for Faith, p 64 {2} [Callista:] 'I feel that God within my heart. I feel myself in His presence. He says to me, "Do this; don't do that." You may tell me that this dictate is a mere law of my nature, as is to joy or to grieve. I cannot understand this. No, it is the echo of a person speaking to me. Nothing shall persuade me that it does not ultimately proceed from a person external to me. It carries with it its proof of its divine origin. My nature feels towards it as towards a person. When I obey it, I feel a satisfaction; when I disobey, a soreness—just like that which I feel in pleasing or offending some revered friend ... I believe in what is more than a mere "something." I believe in what is more real to me than sun, moon, stars, and the fair earth, and the voice of friends. You will say, Who is He? Has He ever told you anything about Himself? Alas! no!—the more's the pity! But I will not give up what I have, because I have not more. An echo implies a voice; a voice a speaker. That speaker I love and I fear.' Callista, Chapter 28. A Sick Call, pp 314-315 [Quoted in part by Pope Saint John Paul II on centenary of Newman's death] {3} … the Supreme Being is of a certain character, which, expressed in human language, we call ethical. He has the attributes of justice, truth, wisdom, sanctity, benevolence and mercy, as eternal characteristics in His nature, the very Law of His being, identical with Himself; and next, when He became Creator, He implanted this Law, which is Himself, in the intelligence of all His rational creatures. The Divine Law, then, is the rule of ethical truth, the standard of right and wrong, a sovereign, irreversible, absolute authority in the presence of men and Angels ... This law, as apprehended in the minds of individual men, is called 'conscience;' and though it may suffer refraction in passing into the intellectual medium of each, it is not therefore so affected as to lose its character of being the Divine Law, but still has, as such, the prerogative of commanding obedience. Anglican Difficulties, Volume 2, Letter to the Duke of Norfolk, Section 5. Conscience, pp 246- 247 {4} [From letter to W G Ward, 26 November 1859] I believe that conscience involves the revelation of a God commanding; this does not oblige me to hold that moral obligation depends simply on that command. I believe it to depend, not solely on the command, but upon the nature of God … my conscience is to me a proof of a God, just as a shadow is a proof of a substance. The shadow does not depend on the mere arbitrary will of the substance for its shape, but on the nature of the substance. Letters and Diaries, Volume 19, Jan 1859 to Jun 1861, p 247 {5} Upon this acknowledgment of the duty of general religious obedience, Christ replied, in the words of the text, 'Thou art not far from the kingdom of God,' [Mark xii. 34] i.e. Thou art not far from being a Christian. In these words, then, we are taught, first, that the Christian's faith and obedience are not the same religion as that of natural conscience, as being some way beyond it; secondly, that this way is 'not far,' not far in the case of those who try to act up to their conscience; in other words, that obedience to conscience leads to obedience to the Gospel, which, instead of being something different altogether, is but the completion and perfection of that religion which natural conscience teaches. Parochial and Plain Sermons, Volume 8, Sermon 14. Obedience to God the Way to Faith in Christ, pp 201-202 [Quoted in part by Pope Saint John Paul II on centenary of Newman's death] {6} God gives us warnings now and then, but does not repeat them. Balaam's sin consisted in not acting upon what was told him once for all … Beware of trifling with your conscience. It is often said that second thoughts are best; so they are in matters of judgment, but not in matters of conscience. In matters of duty first thoughts are commonly best—they have more in them of the voice of God. May He give you grace so to hear what has been said, as you will wish to have heard, when life is over; to hear in a practical way, with a desire to profit by it, to learn God's will, and to do it. Parochial and Plain Sermons, Volume 4, Sermon 2. Obedience without Love, as instanced in the Character of Balaam, pp 35-36 {7} Conscience is not a long-sighted selfishness, nor a desire to be consistent with oneself; but it is a messenger from Him, who, both in nature and in grace, speaks to us behind a veil, and teaches and rules us by His representatives. Conscience is the aboriginal Vicar of Christ, a prophet in its informations, a monarch in its peremptoriness, a priest in its blessings and anathemas … Anglican Difficulties, Volume 2, Letter to the Duke of Norfolk, Section 5. Conscience, pp 248- 249 [Quoted in §1778 of Catechism of the Catholic Church] {8} When men advocate the rights of conscience, they in no sense mean the rights of the Creator, nor the duty to Him, in thought and deed, of the creature; but the right of thinking, speaking, writing, and acting, according to their judgment or their humour, without any thought of God at all. They do not even pretend to go by any moral rule, but they demand, what they think is an Englishman's prerogative, for each to be his own master in all things, and to profess what he pleases, asking no one's leave, and accounting priest or preacher, speaker or writer, unutterably impertinent, who dares to say a word against his going to perdition, if he like it, in his own way. Conscience has rights because it has duties; but in this age, with a large portion of the public, it is the very right and freedom of conscience to dispense with conscience, to ignore a Lawgiver and Judge, to be independent of unseen obligations. Anglican Difficulties, Volume 2, Letter to the Duke of Norfolk, Section 5. Conscience, p 250 [Quoted in part by Pope Saint John Paul II on centenary of Newman's death, and in Encyclical Veritatis Splendor, §34] {9} Conscience is a personal guide, and I use it because I must use myself; I am as little able to think by any mind but my own as to breathe with another's lungs. Conscience is nearer to me than any other means of knowledge. And as it is given to me, so also is it given to others; and being carried about by every individual in his own breast, and requiring nothing besides itself, it is thus adapted for the communication to each separately of that knowledge which is most momentous to him individually,—adapted for the use of all classes and conditions of men, for high and low, young and old, men and women, independently of books, of educated reasoning, of physical knowledge, or of philosophy. Conscience, too, teaches us, not only that God is, but what He is; it provides for the mind a real image of Him, as a medium of worship; it gives us a rule of right and wrong, as being His rule, and a code of moral duties. Moreover, it is so constituted that, if obeyed, it becomes clearer in its injunctions, and wider in their range, and corrects and completes the accidental feebleness of its initial teachings. Conscience, then, considered as our guide, is fully furnished for its office. Grammar of Assent, Chapter 10, pp 389-390 {10} [Letter to Mrs. William Froude, 4 April 1844] … is it not one's duty, instead of beginning with criticism, to throw oneself generously into that form of religion which is providentially put before one? … May we not on the other hand look for a blessing through obedience even to an erroneous system, and a guidance by means of it out of it? Were those who were strict and conscientious in their Judaism, or those who were lukewarm and sceptical, more likely to be led into Christianity, when Christ came? … Certainly, I have always contended that obedience even to an erring conscience was the way to gain light, and that it mattered not where a man began, so that he began on what came to hand and in faith … Letters and Diaries, Volume 10, Nov 1843 to 6 Oct 1845, p 190 {11} Conscience is a stern monitor, but in this century it has been superseded by a counterfeit, which the eighteen centuries prior to it never heard of, and could not have mistaken for it, if they had. It is the right of self-will. Anglican Difficulties, Volume 2, Letter to the Duke of Norfolk, Section 5. Conscience, p 250 {12} … when I speak of Conscience, I mean conscience truly so called. When it has the right of opposing the supreme, though not infallible Authority of the Pope, it must be something more than that miserable counterfeit which, as I have said above, now goes by the name. If in a particular case it is to be taken as a sacred and sovereign monitor, its dictate, in order to prevail against the voice of the Pope, must follow upon serious thought, prayer, and all available means of arriving at a right judgment on the matter in question. And further, obedience to the Pope is what is called 'in possession;' that is, the onus probandi of establishing a case against him lies, as in all cases of exception, on the side of conscience. Unless a man is able to say to himself, as in the Presence of God, that he must not, and dare not, act upon the Papal injunction, he is bound to obey it, and would commit a great sin in disobeying it. Primâ facie it is his bounden duty, even from a sentiment of loyalty, to believe the Pope right and to act accordingly. He must vanquish that mean, ungenerous, selfish, vulgar spirit of his nature, which, at the very first rumour of a command, places itself in opposition to the Superior who gives it, asks itself whether he is not exceeding his right, and rejoices, in a moral and practical matter to commence with scepticism. He must have no wilful determination to exercise a right of thinking, saying, doing just what he pleases, the question of truth and falsehood, right and wrong, the duty if possible of obedience, the love of speaking as his Head speaks, and of standing in all cases on his Head's side, being simply discarded. If this necessary rule were observed, collisions between the Pope's authority and the authority of conscience would be very rare ... I add one remark. Certainly, if I am obliged to bring religion into after-dinner toasts, (which indeed does not seem quite the thing) I shall drink—to the Pope, if you please,—still, to Conscience first, and to the Pope afterwards. Anglican Difficulties, Volume 2, Letter to the Duke of Norfolk, Section 5. Conscience, pp 257- 258, 261 [Last sentence quoted by Pope Benedict XVI, Faith and Politics, VI.2.b. Newman and Socrates: Guides to Conscience, p 116] {13} If any one who hears me is at present moved by what I have said, and feels the remorse and shame of a bad conscience, and forms any sudden good resolution, let him take heed to follow it up at once by acting upon it. I earnestly beseech him so to do. For this reason;—because if he does not, he is beginning a habit of inattention and insensibility. God moves us in order to make the beginning of duty easy. If we do not attend, He ceases to move us. Any of you, my brethren, who will not take advantage of this considerate providence, if you will not turn to God now with a warm heart, you will hereafter be obliged to do so (if you do so at all) with a cold heart;—which is much harder. God keep you from this! Parochial and Plain Sermons, Volume 1, Sermon 8. God's Commandments not Grievous, p 111 Top of page

Conversion

Such is the definition, I may say, of every religious man, who has not the knowledge of Christ; he is on the look-out. As the Jewish believers were on the look-out for a Messias who they knew was to come, so at all times, and under all dispensations, and in all sects, there are those who know there is a truth, who know they do not possess it except in a very low measure, who desire to know more, who know that He alone who has taught them what they know, can teach them more, who hope that He will teach them more, and so are on the look- out for His teaching. Sermons Preached on Various Occasions, Sermon 5. Dispositions for Faith, pp 66-67 {2} [From letter to J J Murphy, 1 June 1873] I thank you for your friendly letter just arrived. And in return I beg to say that, though I believe there is only One True Church and Ark of salvation, yet I know and rejoice to believe that there are those who seek God in sincerity and with good hope, who have not found that True Church and divinely constituted Ark. Letters and Diaries, Volume 32, Supplement, p 330 {3} … there is something which looks like charity in going out into the highways and hedges, and compelling men to come in; but in this matter some exertion on the part of the persons whom I am to convert is a condition of a true conversion ... And how after all, is a man better for Christianity, who has never felt the need of it or the desire? … Men are too well inclined to sit at home, instead of stirring themselves to inquire whether a revelation has been given; they expect its evidences to come to them without their trouble; they act, not as suppliants, but as judges. Grammar of Assent, Chapter 10, Section 2. Revealed Religion, p 425 {4} To me conversions were not the first thing, but the edification of Catholics. So much have I fixed upon the latter as my object, that up to this time the world persists in saying that I recommend Protestants not to become Catholics. And, when I have given as my true opinion, that I am afraid to make hasty converts of educated men, lest they should not have counted the cost, and should have difficulties after they have entered the Church, I do but imply the same thing, that the Church must be prepared for converts, as well as converts prepared for the Church. John Henry Newman, Autobiographical Writings, Henry Tristram, Editor, 1957, p 258 [Quoted by Pope Saint John Paul II on centenary of Cardinalate] {5} [From letter to Mrs. Wilson, 8 January 1870] I can easily believe you were received too soon—for many persons are. They do not know their religion, and difficulties come upon them afterwards, which they ought to have considered before they became Catholics ... I would not say that you have not faith—but your faith is weak—and I speak of its being a gift of God to believe, to remind you, what it must be right to say, even tho' you do not need reminding, that you must pray for it. The Apostles said to our Lord 'Increase our faith.' They were not discouraged—they did not go back and fall away because their faith in Him was tried—they did [not] allow themselves to say, 'Perhaps after all He is not the Christ—why should we attempt to believe Him[?']—but they said 'Increase our faith.' So be sure, my dear Madam, that He will increase yours. He loves you. He has done great things for you, and He will do more still. Only do not doubt … Say 'increase my faith'—go to Mass with this prayer. Letters and Diaries, Volume 25, Jan 1870 to Dec 187, p 6 {6} Let everyone have his own reason for becoming a Catholic; for reasons are in plenty, and there are enough for you all, and moreover all of them are good ones and consistent with each other. Anglican Difficulties, Volume 1, Lecture 12, p 369 {7} [From letter to Mrs. William Froude, 16 June 1848] Oh that you were safe in the True Fold!—I think you will be one day. You will then have the blessedness of seeing God face to face. You will have the blessedness of finding, when you enter a Church, a Treasure Unutterable—the Presence of the Eternal Word Incarnate—the Wisdom of the Father who, even when He had done His work, would not leave us, but rejoices still to humble Himself by abiding in mean places on earth for our sakes, while He reigns not the less on the right hand of God. To know too that you are in the Communion of Saints—to know that you have cast your lot among all those Blessed Servants of God who are the choice fruit of His Passion—that you have their intercessions on high—that you may address them—and above all the Glorious Mother of God, what thoughts can be greater than these? … to know in short that the Atonement of Christ is not a thing at a distance, … what can one ask, what can one desire, more than this? Letters and Diaries, Volume 12, Jan 1847 to Dec 1848, p 224 {8} There are, to be sure, many cogent arguments to lead one to join the Catholic Church, but they do not force the will. We may know them, and not be moved to act upon them. We may be convinced without being persuaded. The two things are quite distinct from each other, seeing you ought to believe, and believing; reason, if left to itself, will bring you to the conclusion that you have sufficient grounds for believing, but belief is the gift of grace. Discourses to Mixed Congregations, Discourse 10. Faith and Private Judgment, p 211 {9} Certainty, in its highest sense, is the reward of those who, by an act of the will, and at the dictate of reason and prudence, embrace the truth, when nature, like a coward, shrinks. You must make a venture; faith is a venture before a man is a Catholic; it is a gift after it. You approach the Church in the way of reason, you enter into it in the light of the Spirit. Loss and Gain, Part III, Chapter VI, p 385 {10} And here, at very first sight, it is plain that, if the Church is to be an available guide to poor as well as rich, unlearned as well as learned, its notes and tokens must be very simple, obvious, and intelligible. They must not depend on education, or be brought out by abstruse reasoning; but must at once affect the imagination and interest the feelings. They must bear with them a sort of internal evidence, which supersedes further discussion and makes their truth self- evident … not such as cannot possibly be explained away or put out of sight, but such as, if allowed room to display themselves, will persuade the many that she is what she professes to be, God's ordained teacher in attaining heaven. Essays Critical and Historical, Volume 1, Essay V. Palmer on Faith and Unity, p 191 {11} You must accept the whole or reject the whole; attenuation does but enfeeble, and amputation mutilate. It is trifling to receive all but something which is as integral as any other portion; and, on the other hand, it is a solemn thing to accept any part, for, before you know where you are, you may be carried on by a stern logical necessity to accept the whole. Development of Christian Doctrine, Chapter 2, p 94 {12} But when a man … falls under the shadow of Catholicism without, then the mighty Creed at once produces an influence upon him. He sees that it justifies his thoughts, explains his feelings … and he is led to ask what is the authority of this foreign teaching; and then, when he finds it is what was once received in England from north to south, in England from the very time that Christianity was introduced here; that, as far as historical records go, Christianity and Catholicism are synonymous; that it is still the faith of the largest section of the Christian world; and that the faith of his own country is held nowhere but within her own limits and those of her own colonies; nay, further, that it is very difficult to say what faith she has, or that she has any,—then he submits himself to the Catholic Church, not by a process of criticism, but as a pupil to a teacher. Loss and Gain, Chapter 2-6, pp 204-205 {13} Of the two, I would rather have to maintain that we ought to begin with believing everything that is offered to our acceptance, than that it is our duty to doubt of everything. The former, indeed, seems the true way of learning. In that case, we soon discover and discard what is contradictory to itself; and error having always some portion of truth in it, and the truth having a reality which error has not, we may expect, that when there is an honest purpose and fair talents, we shall somehow make our way forward, the error falling off from the mind, and the truth developing and occupying it. Thus it is that the Catholic religion is reached, as we see, by inquirers from all points of the compass, as if it mattered not where a man began, so that he had an eye and a heart for the truth. Grammar of Assent, Chapter 9, pp 377-378 {14} … a convert comes to learn, and not to pick and choose. He comes in simplicity and confidence, and it does not occur to him to weigh and measure every proceeding, every practice which he meets with among those whom he has joined. He comes to Catholicism as to a living system, with a living teaching, and not to a mere collection of decrees and canons, which by themselves are of course but the framework, not the body and substance of the Church. And this is a truth which concerns, which binds, those also who never knew any other religion, not only the convert. By the Catholic system, I mean that rule of life, and those practices of devotion, for which we shall look in vain in the Creed of Pope Pius. The convert comes, not only to believe the Church, but also to trust and obey her priests, and to conform himself in charity to her people. It would never do for him to resolve that he never would say a Hail Mary, never avail himself of an indulgence, never kiss a crucifix, never accept the Lent dispensations, never mention a venial sin in confession. All this would not only be unreal, but would be dangerous, too, as arguing a wrong state of mind, which could not look to receive the divine blessing. Moreover, he comes to the ceremonial, and the moral theology, and the ecclesiastical regulations, which he finds on the spot where his lot is cast. And again, as regards matters of politics, of education, of general expedience, of taste, he does not criticize or controvert. And thus surrendering himself to the influences of his new religion, and not risking the loss of revealed truth altogether by attempting by a private rule to discriminate every moment its substance from its accidents, he is gradually so indoctrinated in Catholicism, as at length to have a right to speak as well as to hear. Anglican Difficulties, Volume 2, Letter to Pusey, pp 18-19 {15} Oh, long sought after, tardily found, desire of the eyes, joy of the heart, the truth after many shadows, the fulness after many foretastes, the home after many storms, come to her, poor wanderers, for she it is, and she alone, who can unfold the meaning of your being and the secret of your destiny. She alone can open to you the gate of heaven, and put you on your way. Discourses to Mixed Congregations, Discourse 13. Mysteries of Nature and of Grace, p 281 {16} [From Catholic sermon preached in 1849] Oh, the remorseful sting, 'I was called, I might have answered, and I did not!' And oh, the blessedness, if we can look back on the time of trial, when friends implored and enemies scoffed, and say: The misery for me, which would have been, had I not followed on, had I hung back, when Christ called! Oh, the utter confusion of mind, the wreck of faith and opinion, the blackness and void, the dreary scepticism, the hopelessness, which would have been my lot, the pledge of the outer darkness to come, had I been afraid to follow Him! I have lost friends, I have lost the world, but I have gained Him, who gives in Himself houses and brethren and sisters and mothers and children and lands a hundred-fold; I have lost the perishable, and gained the Infinite; I have lost time, and I have gained eternity … Discourses to Mixed Congregations, Discourse 11. Faith and Doubt, pp 236-237 Top of page

Faith and Reason

… your whole nature must be re-born, your passions, and your affections, and your aims, and your conscience, and your will, must all be bathed in a new element, and reconsecrated to your Maker,—and, the last not the least, your intellect. Apologia, Chapter 5, p 248 {2} … intellect, and even moral virtues, will frequently be found dissociated from the Church, which, in imitation of her Divine Master, calls especially the poor, the sinful and the ignorant: not that she calls them peculiarly, but because her including them repels the rich, the self- righteous and the intellectual. Letters and Diaries, Volume 19, Jan 1859 to Jun 1861, Appendix, p 540 ('Temporal Prosperity, whether a Note of the Church,' Rambler, July 1859) {3} Right Reason, that is, Reason rightly exercised, leads the mind to the Catholic Faith, and plants it there, and teaches it in all its religious speculations to act under its guidance. But Reason, considered as a real agent in the world, and as an operative principle in man's nature, with an historical course and with definite results, is far from taking so straight and satisfactory a direction. It considers itself from first to last independent and supreme; it requires no external authority; it makes a religion for itself. Idea of a University, Discourse 8. Knowledge viewed in relation to Religious Duty, p 181 {4} Quarry the granite rock with razors, or moor the vessel with a thread of silk; then may you hope with such keen and delicate instruments as human knowledge and human reason to contend against those giants, the passion and the pride of man. Idea of a University, Discourse 5. Knowledge its own end, p 121 {5} [From letter to William Froude, 29 April 1879; not sent because Froude had died] … when you say that 'no man of high scientific position but bears in mind that a residue of doubt attaches to the most thoroughly established scientific truths,' I am glad at all times to learn of men of science, as of all men, but I did not require their help in this instance … in your sense of the word 'doubt,' viz a recognition and judgment that the proof is not wholly complete, attaches to all propositions; this I would maintain as well as you. But if you mean that the laws of the human mind do not command and force it to accept as true and to assent absolutely to propositions which are not logically demonstrated, this I think so great a paradox, that all the scientific philosophers in Europe would be unable by their united testimony to make me believe it. That Great Britain is an island is a geographical, scientific truth. Men of science are certain of it; they have in their intellects no doubt at all about it … what scientific men believe of Great Britain, viz that its insularity is an absolute truth, that we believe of the divinity of Christianity … did men in whom we confide come to us stating their conviction that Christianity was not true, we should indeed feel drawn to such men as little as professors of science to the man who would persuade them that Great Britain was joined to the continent, but we should, if we acted rightly, do our utmost, as I have ever tried to do, in the case of unbelievers, to do justice to their arguments. Letters and Diaries, Volume 29, Jan 1879 to Sep 1881, pp 114-115 {6} … whatever be the real distinction and relation existing between Faith and Reason, which it is not to our purpose at once to determine, the contrast that would be made between them, on a popular view, is this,—that Reason requires strong evidence before it assents, and Faith is content with weaker evidence … The same thing is implied in the notion which men of the world entertain, that Faith is but credulity, superstition, or fanaticism; these principles being notoriously such as are contented with insufficient evidence concerning their objects. On the other hand, scepticism, which shows itself in a dissatisfaction with evidence of whatever kind, is often called by the name of Reason. Oxford University Sermons, Sermon 10. Faith and Reason, contrasted as Habits of Mind, p 185 {7} As to Logic, its chain of conclusions hangs loose at both ends; both the point from which the proof should start, and the points at which it should arrive, are beyond its reach; it comes short both of first principles and of concrete issues. Grammar of Assent, Chapter 8, p 284 {8} [Letter to William Henry Goodwin, 13 August 1884] What you, as all men, need, is true first principles, and who can give them to you, but He who made you? It is usual to say that the choice of a religion is an intellectual work and matter of reasoning—it may be an object of the intellect but as a work of reasoning, it is subordinate to first principles, which is the very intellectual gift, which God alone can give us, and from which reasonings follow. You ask me for a 'secret'. The secret is prayer. 'Ask <for true first principles> and it shall be given you: seek and you shall find.' It is a slow process. The same scene looks very different when viewed from various stand points. Pray God to give you a true stand point. Letters and Diaries, Volume 30, Oct 1881 to Dec 1884, p 390 {9} Shall we say that there is no such thing as truth and error, but that anything is truth to a man which he troweth? and not rather, as the solution of a great mystery, that truth there is, and attainable it is, but that its rays stream in upon us through the medium of our moral as well as our intellectual being; and that in consequence that perception of its first principles which is natural to us is enfeebled, obstructed, perverted, by allurements of sense and the supremacy of self, and, on the other hand, quickened by aspirations after the supernatural; so that at length two characters of mind are brought out into shape, and two standards and systems of thought,—each logical, when analyzed, yet contradictory of each other, and only not antagonistic because they have no common ground on which they can conflict? Grammar of Assent, Chapter 8, Section 2, pp 311-312 {10} [From letter to W G Ward, 8 November 1860] .. as the rich man, or the man in authority, has his serious difficulties in going to heaven, so also has the learned … devotion and self rule are worth all the intellectual cultivation in the world. Letters and Diaries, Volume 19, Jan 1859 to Jun 1861, p 417 {11} … do not suppose I have been speaking in disparagement of human reason: it is the way to faith; its conclusions are often the very objects of faith. It precedes faith, when souls are converted to the Catholic Church; and it is the instrument which the Church herself is guided to make use of, when she is called upon to put forth those definitions of doctrine, in which, according to the promise and power of her Lord and Saviour, she is infallible; but still reason is one thing and faith is another, and reason can as little be made a substitute for faith, as faith can be made a substitute for reason. Discourses to Mixed Congregations, Discourse 9. Illuminating Grace, p 187-188 {12} … it is as absurd to argue men, as to torture them, into believing. Oxford University Sermons, Sermon 4. The Usurpations of Reason, p 63 {13} [Letter to Isy Froude, daughter of William, 9 April 1873] 'Our Lord died on the Cross for sinners'—this we are to believe—we cannot prove it—there would be no merit in holding it on the ground that we could prove it. But we are to believe it, because it is told us on trustworthy authority; and according as we believe it or not, we have merit or demerit. This responsibility arises out of the duty of believing the Authority which reveals it to us. Thus the act of faith is of the nature of an act of obedience, and faith, though, considered as the acceptance of a proposition, is an act of the intellect, yet indirectly is a moral act, and is rewarded or punished as such. Letters and Diaries, Volume 26, Jan 1872 to Dec 1873, p 287 {14} What remains, then, but to make our prayer to the Gracious and Merciful God, the Father of Lights, that in all our exercises of Reason, His gift, we may thus use it,—as He would have us, in the obedience of Faith, with a view to His glory, with an aim at His Truth, in dutiful submission to His will, for the comfort of His elect, for the edification of Holy Jerusalem, His Church. Oxford University Sermons, Sermon 15. The Theory of developments in Religious Doctrine, p 351 Top of page

Faith and Politics

It is the present fashion to call Zeal by the name of intolerance, and to account intolerance the chief of sins; that is, any earnestness for one opinion above another concerning God's nature, will, and dealings with man,—or, in other words, any earnestness for the Faith once delivered to the Saints. Parochial and Plain Sermons, Volume 2, Sermon 31. Christian Zeal, p 384 {2} … the Church of Christ doubtless is in high estate everywhere, and so must be, for it is written, 'I will give Thee the heathen for Thine inheritance, and the uttermost parts of the earth for Thy possession.' Yet that while she maintains her ground, she ever suffers in maintaining it; she has to fight the good fight, in order to maintain it: she fights and she suffers, in proportion as she plays her part well; and if she is without suffering, it is because she is slumbering. Her doctrines and precepts never can be palatable to the world; and if the world does not persecute, it is because she does not preach. Parochial and Plain Sermons, Volume 5, Sermon 20. Endurance the Christian's Portion, p 297 {3} … I am speaking against an avowed doctrine maintained in this day, that religion has nothing to do with political matters; which will not be true till it is true that God does not govern the world, for as God rules in human affairs, so must His servants obey in them. And what we have to fear more than anything else at this time is, that persons who are sound on this point, and do believe that the concerns of the nation ought to be carried on on religious principles, should be afraid to avow it, and should ally themselves, without protesting, with those who deny it. Parochial and Plain Sermons, Volume 3, Sermon 15. Contest between Truth and Falsehood in the Church, pp 214-215 {4} [From Letter to Samuel Francis Wood, 4 September 1832] Now, I fear, nothing but the reality of severe suffering will bring us to a right estimate of what we are—and rouse us from this indolent contemplation of our advances in the useful arts and the experimental sciences, to the thought and practice of our duties as immortal beings. The country seems to me to be in a dream—being drugged with this fallacious notion of its superiority to other countries and times.—And I think from this another mistake follows. Men see that those parts of the national system, (and those, of course, far the most important and comprehensive) which really depend on personal and private virtue do not work well—and, not seeing [where] the deficiency lies, viz. in want of personal virtue, they imagine they can put things right by applying their scientific knowledge to the improvement of the existing system—Hence political economy is to supersede morality … I will state a principle, which seems to be most important and most neglected—that the difference between this and that system is as nothing compared with the effects of human will upon them … Letters and Diaries, Volume 3, Jan 1832 to Jun 1833, p 90 {5} To pray for the triumph of religion was, in time past, to pray for the success in political and civil matters of certain sovereigns, governments, parties, nations … But those times are gone. Catholics do not now depend for the success of their religion on the patronage of sovereigns—at least, in England—and it would not help them much if they gained it … I think the best favour which sovereigns, parliaments, municipalities, and other political powers can do us is to let us alone. Sayings of Cardinal Newman, On the Conversion of England, pp 64-65 {6} … are not the principles of unbelief certain to dissolve human society? and is not this plain fact, candidly considered, enough to show that unbelief cannot be a right condition of our nature? for who can believe that we were intended to live in anarchy? Parochial and Plain Sermons, Volume 8, Sermon 8. Inward Witness to the Truth of the Gospel, p 112 {7} I do not mean to say that you are not bound to cultivate peace with all men, and to do them all the offices of charity in your power. Of course you are, and if they respect, esteem, and love you, it redounds to your praise and will gain you a reward; but I mean more than this; I mean they do not respect you, but they like you, because they think of you as of themselves, they see no difference between themselves and you ... we have much cause to be ashamed, and much cause to be anxious what God thinks of us, if we gain their support by giving them a false impression in our persons of what the Catholic Church is and what Catholics are bound to be, what bound to believe, and to do; and is not this the case often, my brethren, that the world takes up your interests, because you share its sins? Discourses to Mixed Congregations, Discourse 8. Nature and Grace, pp 164-165 {8} [From letter to Samuel Rickards, 4 July 1831] When statesmen are bad men, as private characters, we must in private society deal with them as such and avoid them in private—yet professing good principles in their public capacity, we may recognize them in public as men after God's heart and cooperate with them as 'religious and gracious'—but what shall be said when they openly support bad principles, uphold institutions adverse to the Church, and (though in the general calling themselves churchmen) yet in detail avowing heathen sentiments. O my soul, come not into their secret! Letters and Diaries, Volume 2, Jan 1827 to Dec 1831, p 341 {9} A man says, 'I have a right to do this or that; I have a right to give my vote here or there; I have a right to further this or that measure.' Doubtless, you have a right—you have the right of freewill—you have from your birth the birthright of being a free agent, of doing right or wrong, of saving yourself or ruining yourself; you have the right, that is, you have the power—(to speak plainly) the power to damn yourself; but (alas!) a poor consolation will it be to you in the next world, to know that your ruin was all your own fault, as brought upon you by yourself—for what you have said comes to nothing more than this; and be quite sure, men do not lose their souls by some one extraordinary act, but by a course of acts; and the careless, or rather, the self-sufficient and haughty-minded use of your political power, this way or that, at your pleasure, which is now so common, is among those acts by which men save or lose them. Parochial and Plain Sermons, Volume 3, Sermon 15. Contest between Truth and Falsehood in the Church, p 217 {10} … going on to the principles which the Pope's enemies lay down as so very certain, who, that has any pretension to be a religious man, will grant to them that progress in temporal prosperity is the greatest of goods, and that everything else, however sacred, must give way before it? On the contrary, health, long life, security, liberty, knowledge, are certainly great goods, but the possession of heaven is a far greater good than all of them together. With all the progress in worldly happiness which we possibly could make, we could not make ourselves immortal,—death must come; that will be a time when riches and worldly knowledge will avail us nothing, and true faith, and divine love, and a past life of obedience will be all in all to us. If we were driven to choose between the two, it would be a hundred times better to be Lazarus in this world, than to be Dives in the next. Sermons Preached on Various Occasions, Sermon 15. The Pope and the Revolution, p 294 {11} In truth, the Church was framed for the express purpose of interfering, or (as irreligious men will say) meddling with the world. It is the plain duty of its members, not only to associate internally, but also to develop that internal union in an external warfare with the spirit of evil, whether in Kings' courts or among the mixed multitude; and, if they can do nothing else, at least they can suffer for the truth, and remind men of it, by inflicting on them the task of persecution. Arians of the 4th Century, Chapter 3, Section 2. Consequences of the Nicene Council, pp 258- 259 Top of page

Saints

The Saints are the glad and complete specimens of the new creation which our Lord brought into the moral world, and as 'the heavens declare the glory of God' as Creator, so are the Saints the proper and true evidence of the God of Christianity, and tell out into all lands the power and grace of Him who made them. What the existence of the Church itself is to the learned and philosophical, such are the Saints to the multitude. They are the popular evidence of Christianity, and the most complete and logical evidence while the most popular. Letters and Diaries, Volume 12, Jan 1847 to Dec 1848, Appendix 5, p 399 {2} [From letter to an unknown correspondent, 6 November 1869] There are two kinds of worship—divine and human. As to the divine, the characteristic rite of it is sacrifice. Much as we honour the saints, we never offer sacrifice to them … No one comes to God, but by Jesus Xt, as you truly say—but still you would not think it against the Gospel, I suppose, to ask for yourself the prayers of a good man on earth. Why then should you scruple to ask his prayers, when, having left this world and gone to God, he has become possessed of a far greater power. Letters and Diaries, Volume 32, Supplement, pp 302-303 {3} Men of this world spread each other's fame—they vaunt loudly;—you see in every street the names and the statues of the children of men, you hear of their exploits in speeches and histories; yet you care not to know concerning those to whom you are indebted for the light of Gospel truth. Parochial and Plain Sermons, Volume 3, Sermon 17. The Visible Church an Encouragement to Faith, p 249 {4} … look through such manuals of prayers as the Raccolta, and you at once will see both the number and the variety of devotions, which are open to individual Catholics to choose from, according to their religious taste and prospect of personal edification ... The first of these sacred observances … were the devotions paid to the Apostles, then those which were paid to the Martyrs; yet there were Saints nearer to our Lord than either Martyrs or Apostles; but, as if these sacred persons were immersed and lost in the effulgence of His glory, and because they did not manifest themselves, when in the body, in external works separate from Him, it happened that for a long while they were less dwelt upon ... St. Joseph furnishes the most striking instance of this remark … Who, from his prerogatives and the testimony on which they come to us, had a greater claim to receive an early recognition among the faithful than he? A Saint of Scripture, the foster-father of our Lord, he was an object of the universal and absolute faith of the Christian world from the first, yet the devotion to him is comparatively of late date. When once it began, men seemed surprised that it had not been thought of before; and now, they hold him next to the Blessed Virgin in their religious affection and veneration. Anglican Difficulties, Volume 2, Letter to Pusey, pp 29-31 {5} A tedious journey seems shorter when gone in company, yet, be the travellers many or few, each goes over the same ground. Such is the Christian's feeling towards all Saints, but it is especially excited by the Church of Christ and by all that belong to it. For what is that Church but a pledge and proof of God's never-dying love and power from age to age? Parochial and Plain Sermons, Volume 3, Sermon 17. The Visible Church an Encouragement to Faith, p 246 {6} [From letter to Henry Wilberforce from Milan, 24 September 1846] And then to go into St Ambrose's Church—where the body of the Saint lies—and to kneel at those relics, which have been so powerful, and whom I have heard and read of more than other saints from a boy. It is 30 years this very month, as I may say, since God made me religious, and St Ambrose in Milner's history was one of the first objects of my veneration. And St Augustine too—and here he was converted! and here came St Monica seeking him. Here too came the great Athanasius to meet the Emperor, in his exile. I never have been in a city, which moved me more … Letters and Diaries, Volume 11, Oct 1845 to Dec 1846, pp 252-253 {7} [From letter to Edward Berdon, 2 October 1865] Before a person is a judge, whether our devotions to the Blessed Virgin and the Saints are idolatrous or not, he must place himself in the position towards them in which, as a matter of faith, we hold ourselves to be. We believe in a family of God, of which the Saints are the heavenly members and we the earthly—yet one family embracing earth and heaven. We believe we have access to the heavenly members, and are at liberty to converse with them—and that we can ask them for benefits and they can gain them for us. We believe at the same time that they are so different from us, and so much above us, that our natural feelings toward them would be awe, fear and dismay ... these feelings being changed into loving admiration and familiar devotion, by our belief in the Communion of Saints. Letters and Diaries, Volume 22, Jul 1865 to Dec 1866, p 64 {8} [From Letter to Mrs. William Froude, 8 March 1853] Moses, when he saw, as far as flesh can see, the face of God, had revealed to him what was going on at the foot of the mount. Much more then can the Blessed Virgin and the Saints, who actually enjoy the beatific vision, receive from the Omnipresent, Omniscient God, such information about things on earth, as He thinks fit to communicate. The remarkable circumstance in the case of Moses, is, that the Almighty informs him of the sin of his people in order that he might intercede for them—which is just the object for which Catholics say the prayers of the faithful are revealed by Him to the saints. Letters and Diaries, Volume 15, Jan 1852 to Dec 1853, p 318 {9} An ordinary kind of religion, praiseworthy and respectable in its way, may exist under many systems; but saints are creations of the Gospel and the Church. Not that such a one need in his lifetime seem to be more than other well-living men, for his graces lie deep, and are not known and understood till after his death, even if then. But then, it may be, he 'shines forth as the sun in the kingdom of his Father,' figuring in his memory on earth what will be fulfilled in soul and body in heaven. And hence we are not accustomed to give to living men the title of saints, since we cannot well know, while they are among us, who have lived up to their calling and who have not. But in process of time, after death, their excellence perhaps gets abroad; and then they become a witness, a specimen of what the Gospel can do, and a sample and a pledge of all those other high creations of God, His saints in full number, who die and are never known. There are many reasons why God's saints cannot be known all at once;—first, as I have said, their good deeds are done in secret. Next, good men are often slandered, ridiculed, ill-treated in their lifetime; they are mistaken by those, whom they offend by their holiness and strictness, and perhaps they are obliged to withstand sin in their day, and this raises about them a cloud of prejudice and dislike, which in time indeed, but not till after a time, goes off. Then again their intentions and aims are misunderstood; and some of their excellent deeds or noble traits of character are known to some men, others to others, not all to all. This is the case in their lifetime; but after their death, when envy and anger have died away, and men talk together about them, and compare what each knows, their good and holy deeds are added up; and while they evidence their fruitfulness, also clear up or vindicate their motives, and strike the mind of survivors with astonishment and fear; and the Church honours them, thanks God for them, and 'glorifies God in' [Gal. i. 24.] them ... if I am asked to state more fully how such a one differs from an ordinary religious man, I say in this,—that he sets before him as the one object of life, to please and obey God; that he ever aims to submit his will to God's will; that he earnestly follows after holiness; and that he is habitually striving to have a closer resemblance to Christ in all things. Parochial and Plain Sermons, Volume 4, Sermon 10, The Visible Church for the Sake of the Elect, pp 157-158 {10} Cast your thoughts back on the time when our ancient buildings were first reared. Consider the Churches all around us; how many generations have past since stone was put upon stone till the whole edifice was finished! The first movers and instruments of its erection, the minds that planned it, and the limbs that wrought at it, the pious hands that contributed to it, and the holy lips that consecrated it, have long, long ago, been taken away; yet we benefit by their good deed. Does it not seem a very strange thing that we should be fed, and lodged, and clothed in spiritual things, by persons we never saw or heard of, and who never saw us, or could think of us, hundreds of years ago? Does it not seem strange that men should be able, not merely by acting on others, not by a continued influence carried on through many minds in a long succession, but by one simple and direct act, to come into contact with us, and as if with their own hand to benefit us, who live centuries later? What a visible, palpable specimen this, of the communion of saints! Parochial and Plain Sermons, Volume 6, Sermon 19. The Gospel Palaces, pp 273-274 {11} … let us go by the judgment of that line of Saints, from the Apostles' times downwards, who were ever spoken against in their generation, ever honoured afterwards,—singular in each point of time as it came, but continuous and the same in the line of their history,—ever protesting against the many, ever agreeing with each other. And, in proportion as we attain to their judgment of things, let us pray God to make it live in us; so that at the Last Day, when all veils are removed, we may be found among those who are inwardly what they seem outwardly,—who with Enoch, and Noah, and Abraham, and Moses, and Joshua, and Caleb, and Phineas, and Samuel, and Elijah, and Jeremiah, and Ezekiel, and the Baptist, and St. Paul, have 'borne and had patience, and for His Name-sake laboured and not fainted,' watched in all things, done the work of an Evangelist, fought a good fight, finished their course, kept the faith. Parochial and Plain Sermons, Volume 5, Sermon 18. Many Called, Few Chosen, pp 268-269 {12} Be my soul with the Saints! Anglican Difficulties, Volume 1, Lecture 12, p 388 Top of page