Chapter 24: Understanding the Holy Eucharist
CHAPTER 24
UNDERSTANDING THE
HOLY EUCHARIST
THROUGHOUT his years at Oriel College, Newman used the adjective “catholic”—for example, “catholic system” or “catholic ethos”—without referring to the Roman Catholic Church. He was an Anglican and believed that the Anglicans held the doctrine of the Church Fathers and first Christian centuries; he believed they were “Catholic” without giving allegiance to Rome. In 1838, however, by understanding further the difficulties in Anglican doctrine regarding the Holy Eucharist and prayers for the deceased, he realized how much Anglican theology had suffered with the Protestant Reformation. Newman began to think that Anglican theology lacked an internal presumption of truth. Instead of being a living body that grows and expands, it was like a group of contradictory doctrines heaped one on top of another.1
Whereas in 1837, Newman had continued his reflection on the sacrament of Baptism and the other rites considered sacraments by the Roman Catholic Church, in the year 1838 he advanced in his understanding of the Catholic doctrine on the sacrament of the Holy Eucharist. These developments took place as he looked for an editor for the British Critic. He eventually accepted the appointment himself at the beginning of 1838.
The British Critic, founded in 1793, was a conservative monthly which was eventually acquired by a group of High Churchmen in 1825, who turned the periodical into a quarterly. From the outset of the Oxford Movement, Newman chose to work within established publications instead of beginning a new journal. He thought the British Critic was one that would suit the Movement and arranged for like-minded men to write articles for the British Critic without pay. Soon, however, he became annoyed with the unorthodox views of the editor and felt he must stop writing for the British Critic.
In November 1837, the editor resigned and the search for a replacement began. The same month Newman wrote his friend, Edward Churton, rector of a church in Durham: “Men do nothing for nothing—what these men want, is an organ.”2 Newman knew that the men who wrote for the British Critic did not wish to be paid; instead, they sought a paper with a coherent internal ethos, a “Catholic temper.” He hoped to convince Churton, who was a year older than he and sympathetic to the Oxford Movement, to become editor. Churton declined editorship, as did Manning, whom Newman asked next. Samuel Maitland, a historian from Cambridge University and librarian to London’s Archbishop, took up the editorship on a trial basis, but resigned after only one issue. In January of 1838, Newman, against his will, was named editor; he did not wish the journal to fall into the hands of others.
Without delay, Newman overhauled the journal. He asked Churton and others, such as Robert Francis Wilson and Manning, to contribute regularly for the sum of 7 guineas a sheet starting in July, concurrent with his editorship. He asked Henry Wilberforce to write four times a year, warning him the pay would be very bad. He regretted that Maitland had stepped down and commented: “But no wonder—he was setting out on a voyage of adventure with a rum crew and thought twice before he cut the cable.”
The subject of the reviews and articles varied a lot. Newman asked Henry Wilberforce to write either on the Scottish Establishment or the Church extension system. Robert Isaac Wilberforce wrote one on the life of John Jay, Chief Justice of the United States. Of course, Newman would also write for the journal. He had trouble with the first issue of the British Critic under his editorship because some writers failed to send in their articles. Some of his closest friends got him out of the bind by writing articles. Bowden, Keble, Charles Le Bas, Rogers, Sewell, J. Mozley, Charles Thornton, and Newman himself were the authors of the articles for the first issue.
The January 1838 issue of the British Critic published an article by Rogers on “Froude’s Remains.” Newman wrote to Wilson, praising the article and remarking on Pusey’s astonishment at Froude, whom he had once considered merely a “good-natured, sharp schoolboy”; Pusey now exclaimed, “We have a giant.”3 William Froude wrote that his father was pleased with the book, and Sir Francis Palmer, a medieval historian and convert from Judaism, wrote a favorable review of The Remains for the July issue of Gentleman’s Magazine.
Palmer wrote to Newman that he would have been glad if some passages had been omitted, but people would recognize Froude’s candor toward friends. Edward Churton complained at first about passages and pages but later acknowledged that people were misguided and needed guides such as Froude. Newman told Manning that, as expected, Froude’s friends were getting into hot water in some places about The Remains, but “if we can but turn it into steam, and direct it aright, it may accelerate our motion toward desirable objects.”
For Newman and Keble, however, it had been very important to publish Froude’s papers. They contained not only the Tractarian ethos, but they were also a sort of biography of Froude, which could have an important influence on others. Froude had exerted a powerful influence on Newman’s religious path. Newman described it: “a stage in the history of my own mind.”4
At the end of March 1838, Newman’s Lectures on Justification, which he had delivered the previous year, were published. Newman remarked to Pusey that the Medieval Schoolmen hardly touched the subject of Justification, and since the Reformation much had been written on it. Earlier in January, a somewhat embarrassed Richard Bagot, Bishop of Oxford, accepted Newman’s kind dedication of the Lectures on Justification. Newman confided to Henry Wilberforce that it was this book that (until then) had cost him the most in time and trouble. Unfortunately, the book received a harsh review from Charles Web LeBas, a High Churchman and Cambridge alumnus, who was a frequent contributor to the British Critic. He asserted that the book was not only taxing to read but at times mystical.
While Newman did not criticize the bishops in his articles and sermons, he was aware of the harm caused by bad bishops and of the necessity for good appointments to vacant Sees. In 1837, in light of the disturbing state of deficient and unorthodox bishops, Newman confided to Maria Giberne that good Christians must hope in God without fearing the government or bishops. He even went as far as to say that “when a bishop is heretical, man, woman or child has license to oppose him.”5 However, out of respect for the office of bishop, Newman always obeyed; he reminded Maria that things were much worse off in the time of St. Athanasius. When the Arian Heresy was widespread, its erroneous ideas had fooled hundreds of bishops.
When Edward Denison, an Oriel Man, was given a political appointment in 1837 as the Bishop of Salisbury by the Whig Prime Minister, Lord William Melbourne, Newman commented that for the following ten to twenty years they must expect appointments like him, “very respectable men of no principles in a strict sense of the word.”6 Nonetheless, the following year he wrote to Miss Holdsworth that although it was lamentable when bishops were chosen by the State, their ordination was valid because they were consecrated by existing bishops who exercised the power of their office.
There were, however, a few good bishops. One orthodox and courageous bishop was the Bishop of Exeter, Henry Phillpotts. During a debate in the House of Lords on a Church Discipline Bill, Phillpotts said that no one would keep him from excommunicating a clergyman who disobeyed. Phillpotts insisted that even if a bill were passed to punish him, he would never act as to be unworthy before Heaven. In a charge delivered to his clergy in 1836, the bishop had exhorted them to be faithful and regular in the use of all services in the Prayer Book and to assert without fear the true authority of their ministerial office.7
During this time when Newman was concerned both with the doctrine of Justification and the appointment of orthodox bishops, he continued to reflect on the subject of the Holy Eucharist. In a letter dated February 1838, he explained his understanding of the Eucharistic sacrifice to Miss Holdsworth. Besides referring her to Tract 81, he told her that the word “sacrifice” appears at least twice in the Book of Prayers. He lamented that the Protestant innovators did not use the word “altar,” but, he explained, it would only stand to reason that where there is a priest and a sacrifice, there must be an “altar.”8 He wrote that the Holy Eucharist “is not only a sacramental representation, and also a real and proper sacrifice of bread and wine, but a sacramental Presence of Christ Crucified—the shadow, as it were, of the Cross on Calvary being continued to the end of the world …”9 He referred her to John Johnson’s “Unbloody Sacrifice and Altar,” and mentioned an essay on Eucharistic Sacrifice by Froude that would later appear in the third volume of The Remains.
This fundamental idea of the Holy Eucharist as a sacrament and as a sacrifice continued in the forefront of Newman’s mind when, in March of 1838, he edited and wrote the preface to Christopher Sutton’s “Godly Meditations upon the Most Holy Sacrament of the Lord’s Supper.” Also, in the following month, he married a couple who had asked to receive the Eucharist after the sacrament of Matrimony. In July, he replied to a comment made by his friend, Hugh James Rose, who, possibly upon reading Froude’s Remains, argued for doctrinal reserve in speaking about the Holy Eucharist. Newman acknowledged the value in the first century custom of using reserve in speaking with non-Christians, but he asserted that ordinary men needed to hear about the Apostolic origins of parts of Eucharistic Service.
In the same letter to Rose, Newman also noted that when questions arose regarding the Eucharist, such as innovations, or omissions in the liturgy, the subject must be addressed. He expressed praise for the Roman Catholic use of the terms “sacrifice” and “memory” within the Mass and, at the same time, lamented the Roman Catholic refusal of the “Cup to the Laity.”10 The denial of the cup or chalice with the consecrated wine to the laity became common in the thirteenth century. This was at first due to fear of profanation by spilling the Blood of Christ. At the same time, the usage was considered a way of teaching people that the whole Christ is present in each of the elements.
On May 13, the fourth Sunday of Easter, Newman preached a sermon titled “The Eucharistic Presence.” In the sermon, he explained the meaning of Christ’s words at the multiplication of the loaves as Christ’s promise of the sacrament of the Holy Eucharist. According to Newman those words foreshadow Christ’s words at the Last Supper when he instituted the Holy Eucharist. At this point Newman held an attenuated version of the Catholic doctrine of Transubstantiation, the teaching that with the words of Consecration, the bread and wine become the true Body and Blood of Christ, not a symbol, or a promise. He explained the Anglican position thus:
The Church has never thought little of the gift; so far from it, we know that one very large portion of Christendom holds more than we hold. That belief, which goes beyond ours, shows how great the gift is really. I allude to the doctrine of what is called Transubstantiation, which we do not admit; or that the bread and wine cease to be, and that Christ’s sacred Body and Blood are directly seen, touched, and handled, under the appearances of Bread and Wine.11
Only a week later, Godfrey Faussett, Lady Margaret Professor of Divinity, preached a sermon at St. Mary’s titled The Revival of Popery in which he made scouring remarks on Froude’s unguarded expressions and visionary sentiments in The Remains. He criticized Rome as the Antichrist and the Tractarians for leading others toward popery. Faussett published his sermon, and Newman was able to publish a rebuttal almost immediately.
In his reply, Newman made a sharp defense against Faussett’s accusations. He affirmed that Froude’s opinions did not contradict the fundamental doctrines of Anglican Communion; he pointed out that Anglican theologians had held similar beliefs to those espoused by Froude. He quoted, for instance, various passages from the writings of Bramhall, Archbishop of Armagh, who in the seventeenth century stated that Anglicans did not deny that the Sacrament is the Body of Christ, but rather they disagreed on the manner of the Transubstantiation.12 Newman noted that Froude had sharply criticized the Council of Trent for making some doctrines a condition for communion with the Catholic Church. At the same time, Newman argued that Anglicans who denounced those who did not accept Protestant errors, did for the Anglican Church what Trent had done for the Roman Church; they excluded some of its members from its communion.13
Froude thought that the condemnations of the decrees from the Tridentine Council were an insuperable obstacle in the union of Anglicans with the Roman See. Newman then put the question to Faussett:
“I will but ask by which of the Articles, by what part of the Prayer Book, is a member of our Church bound to acknowledge the Reformers, or to profess himself a Protestant? Nowhere. To force him then to do so, when he fain would not, is narrowing our terms of communion; it is in fact committing the same error which we urge against the Roman Catholics.”14
Newman rebutted another accusation made by Faussett: that the Church of Rome was the Antichrist. Newman countered with the observation that if this were so, then the Anglican Church, whose origins dated to Pope Gregory the Great, was also a son of the Antichrist. He noted that by the same token, the same attack on the Church of Rome was now used by Dissenters on the Anglican Church. He wrote:
If Rome has “committed fornication with the kings of the earth,” then what must be said of the Church of England with her temporal power, her Bishops in the House of Lords, her dignified clergy, her prerogatives, her pluralities, her buying and selling of preferments, her patronage, her corruptions, and her abuses? If Rome’s teaching be a deadly heresy, what is the Anglican Church, which “destroys more souls than it saves?”15
Newman was ashamed by the beliefs he had professed five years earlier and the language that he had used at that time. Then on a visit to Rome, Newman had alternated between condemning either the Church of Rome or Pagan Rome. At this point, there was no doubt in his mind about the meaning of chapters 17 and 18 of the Apocalypse:
“Take the chapters literally, and sure it is, Rome is spoken of; but then she must have literal merchants, ships, and sailors; therefore it is not Papal Rome but Pagan. Take them figuratively; and then, sure it is, merchants and merchandize, may mean indulgences and traffickers in them; but then the word Rome perhaps is figurative also, as well as her merchandize. Nay, I should almost say, it must be; for the city is called not only Rome but Babylon; and if Babylon is a figurative title, why should not Rome be?”16
In his rebuttal of Faussett, Newman indicated Froude’s condemnation of the seemingly idolatrous worship of saints among Roman Catholics and concurred with it, but admitted that it would be difficult to ascertain how much of this was truly the practice. He also expressed the idea that feelings of reverence for the crucifix should be understood as being similar to the feelings for the portrait of a loved one.17
The main part, however, of Newman’s open letter to Faussett was on the Holy Eucharist. Here Newman reaffirmed his professed doctrine on the Eucharist: that the Real Presence of Christ with His body, blood, soul, and divinity is present in the consecrated species of Bread and Wine. Newman clarified this by explaining the position of the Anglican Divines, who believed that Christ is really present, not in an imaginary way, in the consecrated bread and wine, yet not present in a local space. The Divines objected that if Christ were present locally in Heaven, He could not be locally present at the same time in the consecrated bread. They believed that Christ was present in some unknown way but did not speak of the manner of His presence. As an Anglican, Newman asserted Christ’s Body to be really present in the Holy Eucharist, but not locally. He suggested that there may be a spiritual sense by which one perceives His presence, since Our Lord’s risen body was not subject to the laws of space.18
Newman thought that the Roman Catholic theologian St. Robert Bellarmine spoke of Christ being present locally in two places at the same time. However, in a footnote he quoted Bellarmine, who actually spoke of Christ being present substantially, that is, on account of the substance rather than locally.19 Bellarmine followed St. Thomas Aquinas, who had held that “the body of Christ is in this sacrament by way of substance, and not by way of quantity.”20 The entire Christ is in the Sacrament, but without extension. In the Eucharist the accident of quantity, by which a substance ordinarily occupies a place, is miraculously separate from the substance of Christ so that He is not localized in the dimensions of the bread and wine.21 Newman’s point of contention with Faussett was, however, not the precise theological question about the manner of Christ’s Real Presence, but the general doctrine of Transubstantiation that Faussett mistakenly declared to be dangerous and contrary to Anglican theology.22
Newman reproved the Lady Margaret Professor of Divinity for taking a Lutheran view of the Holy Eucharist. Luther believed that Christ was present in the bread only in a spiritual manner, but not that the bread became the Body of Christ. According to Luther the Body and Blood of Christ coexist with the bread and wine (consubstantial presence). In his letter to the Lady Margaret Professor, Newman asserted that Anglican theology did in fact accept a doctrine of Transubstantiation, albeit it is different from that held by Roman Catholics. According to Newman, Anglicans believe that the consecrated elements are an efficacious sign of Christ’s spiritual presence, yet they are more than a sign; “in some unknown way the soul becomes possessed at once of Christ according to its nature.”23 Because of Newman’s belief in Christ’s Real Presence in the Eucharist, he took great care of Eucharistic worship and the beauty surrounding it. Many people gave Newman gifts that helped him dignify the liturgical worship, both at St. Mary’s and at the Church in Littlemore. In 1838, someone gave him an organ for Littlemore Chapel, and Bowden gave him stained glass. Newman commented that this was the law of faith and its reward: Ask much and you gain much. He also cared for the smaller details, such as the acquisition of proper altar cloths and a paten for distribution of Holy Communion. At this point in time, despite the writings of the Church Fathers and the Anglican Homilies that refer to Matrimony and the other sacraments, Newman still restricted the number of sacraments to Baptism and the Holy Eucharist.
During 1838, Newman corresponded with Samuel Francis Wood and Henry Arthur Woodgate. Samuel Francis Wood, educated at Eton and later at Oriel under Newman, became an ardent Tractarian and a good friend of Newman. Wood lived in London, where he studied law. Wood suggested publishing extracts from John Johnson’s The Unbloody Sacrifice to show the differences between Anglican and Roman Catholic doctrine on the Eucharist. The extracts were later included in Pusey’s Tract 81. This Tract gathered the testimony of Anglican Divines against the Roman Catholic doctrine of Transubstantiation.
In 1838, Newman sent Woodgate a small sacrament case in which to carry the Sacrament to a sick person. Newman wished to thank him for kindness toward Mrs. Newman in the past. Woodgate, who frequently corresponded with Newman, sought him out for suggestions for his Bampton Lectures on the Authoritative Teaching of the Church. Woodgate dedicated these lectures, published in 1839, to him. Newman was in regular contact with other Tractarians: Isaac Williams, Robert Williams, and Richard William Church. Isaac Williams was busy in 1838; that year he published a book of poetry titled The Cathedral. The previous year he had written three Tracts. Robert Williams, Newman’s former pupil, who attended Oriel in 1829, became a Conservative M.P. for Dorchester. Another Tractarian was Richard W. Church, who later wrote The History of the Oxford Movement. In April 1838, Church was elected Fellow at Oriel and Newman told his sister Jemima that he considered it to be a big gain for the college: “he is in every respect a desirable man, as far as one can judge—and of true and understanding Apostolical ἦθος (ethos).”24
Toward the end of the year Newman and the Tractarians were joined by a new group of men, consisting of Frederick W. Faber, William G. Ward, Frederick Oakeley, Dalgairns, and Thomas E. Morris. These Anglo-Catholic men, who were for the most part Newman’s friends and students, were heading in a straight path toward union with Rome. They had learned from Newman and were drawing conclusions on their own, by questioning whether or not the Anglican Church was a true church and part of the one Catholic Church established by Jesus Christ. Newman provided unity between this new group, which was moving toward Rome, and the group composed of those like Keble and Pusey who wished to purify the Anglican Church by recovering Catholic truths, without moving toward Rome.25
Throughout the year visitors who were not Tractarians also came to see Newman at Oxford. These visitors ranged from strangers, such as clergymen from the United States, to friends, such as Manning, who sought his advice. Newman encouraged Manning, Archdeacon in the See of Chichester at that time, to be the principal of a theological college that was proposed for his diocese. Naturally the Tractarians also looked to Newman for guidance. Thomas Acland, M.P., who was at the center of a group of Tractarians in London, asked Newman for advice regarding plans for a national school system. Acland wished to know what role the Church could play and how best to protect the Church’s interest in education. Newman urged him to form a body of members of Parliament with his friends to oppose radical measures on the subject of education or other matters.
Others wrote Newman to criticize his views. Some of these were people he did not know and others were friends or acquaintances. Woods and Richard Church told Newman their disagreements openly. Newman respected their opinions even though they sometimes hurt his sensitivity. He was quite annoyed, however, when people spoke of him behind his back, as was the case with Samuel Wilberforce.
A controversial subject was prayer for the deceased. The Tractarians rediscovered this early Church practice through the study of Church History and the Church Fathers. Since the first century, Christians have prayed for eternal rest of loved ones and friends. Early Christian communities celebrated Masses asking God for the eternal happiness of the deceased. These Masses were celebrated in the catacombs, the early underground Christian burial sites, as well as in open cemeteries. Christians chose to bury their dead close to the tombs of Christians who had died holy deaths, especially martyrs.
Protestant Reformers of the Church in England interrupted the custom of praying for the souls of the deceased. The practice, however, did not become extinct; Newman noted that the Bishop of Bath and Wells prayed for the soul of Princess Charlotte Augusta in a sermon the week after her interment. Since the death of his sister Mary, Newman began to realize the necessity and naturalness of praying for the deceased. When Manning’s wife died, Newman prayed for her deceased soul, albeit with some hesitation since it broke with Anglican customs.
Newman argued with George S. Faber on the orthodoxy of praying for the deceased. Newman told Faber that the whole of the faith can be found in Scripture, but ordinances, or concrete norms, such as prayer for the deceased, need not be shown in Scripture; they could be sanctioned by Catholic Tradition just as the Lord’s Day had been changed from Saturday to Sunday. According to Newman, Catholic Tradition deemed this type of prayer “pleasing to God and in some unknown way useful to the dead.” He wrote: “Why may I not believe a thing not in the Bible, if I do not force the belief on others?”26 Newman considered this practice to be one left to private judgment, not an article of faith. He told George Faber that there are many rites and ceremonies, such as using the Cross in Baptism, that are not scriptural. When Faber pointed out that no author before Tertullian ever mentioned the practice, Newman retorted that testimony for the authenticity of some New Testament books was also scant and even less than that of prayers for the dead. If Faber believed in the canon of the New Testament he should believe in prayers for the dead.
From the exchange of letters with Faber it is clear that Newman now conceded a greater role to Apostolic Tradition than during his 1834 to 1835 controversy with Abbé Jager. Newman’s sermons, letters, and books demonstrate a detailed knowledge of Sacred History and of the arguments and answers given to difficult biblical passages. As the years went by, however, Newman realized that the content of the Creed cannot be proven by Scripture alone; it calls for the interpretation of the Apostles and their immediate successors.
That very month of May in which Newman wrote to Faber about Scripture proofs, Newman began a series of twelve lectures, “Lectures on the Scripture Proof of the Doctrines of the Church,” in the Adam de Brome Chapel of St. Mary’s. In the first lecture, Newman refuted the common objection that the necessary proof for doctrine contained in the Creed is that the stated doctrine must be explicitly found more than once in Scripture. Newman concluded this lecture stating:
that it does not follow that a doctrine or rite is not divine, because it is not directly stated in Scripture; that there are some wise and unknown reasons for doctrines being, as we find them, not clearly stated there. To be sure, I might take the other alternative, and run the full length of skepticism, and openly deny that any doctrine or duty, whatever it is, is divine, which is not stated in Scripture beyond all contradiction and objection.27
Eight of the lectures were published that same year as Tract 85.
Besides the lectures, Newman worked on various projects. He devised setting up a house for writers (“young monks”) who would help him and Pusey edit the translations of the Church Fathers. Mrs. Pusey, Robert Williams, and William Bowden each gave money for this project, and in October, Newman rented a house for this purpose in Oxford on Aldate Street, opposite Christ Church. It was hard to find men for the house who would later aspire to Fellowships because by their association with Newman they would become marked men. The house was not the success that Newman expected, but three of the residents, Pattison, Christie, and Mozley succeeded in obtaining Fellowships.
A bigger project was one for the formation of clergy. In August of the same year, Newman supported a plan by Pusey to establish a college for clergy at Manchester. It was based on an earlier idea by Froude to impart religious education to the working classes of the manufacturing cities such as Manchester and Birmingham. Like Froude, Newman thought the celibate clergymen would make a greater impression on people. The potential patrons for the college in Manchester fell through, but despite the failure in starting a college, Pusey’s generosity and efforts led to the construction of the Church of Our Saviour in Leeds.
More than by these failures Newman was saddened by the charge made by Richard Bagot, Bishop of Oxford, on August 14, 1838. Although the bishop praised the Tracts for recalling “forgotten truths,” he faulted them for “ambiguity of expression” and the placing of others at risk of falling into superstition.28 Newman considered discontinuing them and sought Keble’s advice. Newman wrote Archdeacon Clerke asking him if he knew to which Tracts the bishop objected, so that he could remove them at once. Clerke suggested that Newman meet with the bishop.
Newman told Bowden that he felt the bishop had given them a slap. Nothing had been found in the Tracts that could be accused of Romanism; on the contrary, the Tracts were found to be sincere and to express the desirable recommendation of keeping fasts and festivals. Less positively, they had been found to have “expressions which might be injurious to particular minds.”29 Even though the bishop spoke of the importance of observing the rubrics, he had cast a general suspicion over all the volumes. Newman considered that these remarks by the bishop might simply be a check; yet for Newman, even the slightest disapproving word from his bishop (ex cathedra) was heavy.30 Taking a different view than Keble, Bowden replied that withdrawing the Tracts would be like a recantation of all his principles; no one would believe that the withdrawal was done in deference to Episcopal authority. He urged Newman not to act unless he had a very clear directive from the bishop.31
When the charge was published, it had a footnote in which the bishop declared there was no censure on the Tracts; he stated that he believed the authors would always submit to his authority. Newman, however, felt dejected; he confided to Pusey that he felt like “a nobody” writing. He was neither bishop nor professor. The Tracts did not have the approbation of the bishop. Although the bishop was polite, he was not a friend. Newman understandably felt himself under a cloud of suspicion.
As in the previous year, Newman continued to reside at Oriel and to take part in the university life, even though he did not have any pupils at his college. He kept abreast of the appointments of college heads and university professors. He was satisfied by another type of appointment, the choice of Harrison, one of the Tractarians and a lecturer in Hebrew, to replace Ogilvie as chaplain to the Archbishop of Canterbury. While chaplain to the Archbishop, however, Harrison distanced himself from the Tractarian ideals.
At Littlemore, there was new activity: the construction of a school building, which Newman was happy to see completed even though he remarked that it was not a handsome building. For the chapel he commissioned a memorial of his mother from Richard Westamacott. It was to be a simple memorial with a female figure exchanging a measuring line or a plan with an angel.
During the long summer vacation of 1838, Newman remained at Oxford attending to his pastoral duties except for a one-week stay in London for repeated visits to the dentist. To J. F. Christie, one of his friends, he complained in jest of being alone: “I am solus here … Do come up for the day.”32 Aside from his friends, he liked to be alone with his books; only five days later he wrote to James Mozley: “I am quite solus—you cannot think what a relief it is.”33 Although many of those days he dined alone in the Common Room, he did have occasional visitors, including Maria Giberne and her sister. Newman was also quite busy preparing lectures, making plans for printing the other volumes of The Remains and answering correspondence.
As usual, Newman maintained frequent correspondence with friends and family; sometimes his family members visited, and he tried to return the visits. In September Harriet and Thomas Mozley visited him, and in October, he visited his sister Jemima and her family in Derby. It had been two years since he had been at Derby. During this period his brother-in-law James B. Mozley married one of the daughters of James A. Ogle, a physician, ten years older than Newman, who had been his private Tutor at Trinity. Ogle became Regius Professor in 1851, and remained Newman’s friend all his life.
The work on the Library of the Church Fathers advanced slowly but surely; the fourth and fifth volumes appeared in 1839. Except for the time of his visit to his sister Jemima at Derby, Newman continued to preach at St. Mary’s, and in his diary, he recorded the title of the sermon that he preached each Sunday. He prepared for publication his four volumes of sermons, which appeared in November of 1838 with a dedication to his friend Hugh Rose. Evoking the meeting that began the Movement, Newman wrote of Rose: “When hearts were failing bade us stir up the gift that was in us and betake ourselves to our true mother.”34
At Oxford, Newman’s life was not tranquil. Because he stood for a strong religious ideal, he was inevitably drawn into controversies. From the start of 1838, Rev. Charles Golightly made plans to build a Memorial to the English Reformers—Thomas Cranmer, Nicholas Ridley, and Hugh Latimer. They had been tried and executed for heresy by Queen Mary. The memorial was devised as a countermovement against the criticism of the Reformers in Froude’s Remains. It became a test of anti-Roman sentiments, and Newman and other authors of the Tracts were urged to subscribe to it. Golightly had been Newman’s curate at Littlemore, but when Golightly preached against Pusey’s views on Baptism, Newman had dismissed him. Soon afterward, Golightly became an enemy of the Tractarians and sought every opportunity to attack them.
Bishop Bagot supported the project and urged Pusey to do likewise. Pusey was willing to commemorate certain aspects of the Reformation but not the Reformers. For this reason and because the plan was an attack on Newman, he declined to subscribe to it. Keble and Newman also declined. Despite their minor opposition, the Martyr’s Memorial was erected in 1841. It was an imposing Gothic stone cross on St. Giles Street close to Broad Street.
On top of external criticism of the Tractarians, there were also internal struggles among the Tractarians that rose to a crisis. The men disagreed on plans for the proper translation and publication of the Roman Breviary and also with the editorship of the Tracts. At the beginning of 1838, Robert Williams and Samuel Wood began their own project of translating the Roman Breviary, which they wished to publish privately for subscribers only. Newman encouraged them, but they faced opposition from other Tractarians, who feared they would be labeled Romanists because of the translation. George Prevost, a supporter of the Oxford Movement and a pupil of Keble, asked Newman to suppress the publication of the Breviary and offered to pay the expenses incurred by the editors.
Earlier in the year, Newman had published a volume of a translation of Breviary hymns, Hymni Ecclesiae, excerpti e Breviario Parisiensi, with an English Preface. In this preface he wrote:
[T] houghtful minds naturally revert to the discarded collections of the ante-reform era, discarded because of associations with which they were then viewed, and of the interpolations by which they were disfigured; but which, when purified from these, are far more profitable to the Christian than the light and wanton effusions which are their present substitute among us.35
It was a praise for the doctrinal depth and literary beauty of prayers put aside by reformers.
Keble advised omitting certain legends about saints and hymns, such as Ave Maris Stella, from the proposed translation of the Breviary. Newman prepared to make the necessary omissions, but Wood and Williams decided to suspend the project. They thought it would produce substantial alteration of the Breviary. After their decision to suspend the publication of the Breviary, Newman published a second volume of Latin hymns, Hymni Ecclesiae, excerpti e Breviariis Romano, Sarisburiensi, Eboracensi et aliunde.
This debate over whether or not to publish the Breviary signaled a growing division among the Tractarians. Although immediate problems had been averted, tension between them was growing. Newman was disappointed by the lack of trust and respect of some of his friends. Newman felt the loss of confidence of the group. After the reaction to The Remains and the tiff over the proposed publication of the Breviary, Newman felt attacked from all sides by friends and foes. He wrote Bowden, “It is just like walking on treacherous ice—one cannot say a thing but one offends someone or other.”36 Keble advised Newman to expect contradictions in his position as a leader. He also reminded Newman of his character: “[F]or you know, my dear N. you are a very sensitive person.”37
Undergirding all these problems was one of greater weight. Newman and the translators of the Breviary wished to restore the Catholicism that had been destroyed by the reformers. He spoke of the Lutheranizing influence of the reformers on the Book of Common Prayer. For Keble, and also Pusey, the Reformation was a true reform—one that sought a more primitive and pure Catholicism.38 Newman had agreed to the cessation of the publication of the Breviary because he realized there were no principles short of private judgment for adapting the Breviary for Anglican usage. The whole affair saddened Newman.
Like Newman, some of Tractarians were more inclined to the Roman Catholic Church. They believed in the Real Presence and tried to understand the doctrine of Transubstantiation. They prayed for the deceased, a practice they found in Christian Antiquity and Tradition. In a letter to Professor Faussett, Newman gave unwitting evidence to the fact that he was becoming Roman Catholic. In it, Newman urged greater fidelity to the faith of their ancestors and commitment to holiness.
This is the way to withstand and repel Roman Catholics; not by cries of alarm, and rumours of plots, and dispute, and denunciation, but by living up to the Creeds, the services, the ordinances, the usages of our own Church without fear of consequences, without fear of being called Papists; to let matters take their course freely, and to trust to God’s good Providence for the issue.39
Newman had a very high respect for the Episcopal office and showed a refined reverence and obedience to the Bishop of Oxford. Not long after the bishop’s charge, Bishop Bagot opposed Newman’s editorship of the British Critic and the publication of Tract 90. In both matters, Newman obeyed his superior, but before then, in 1839, Newman had begun to face the first major problems in the Anglican Church.
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1Morales, Newman (1801-1890), 96-97.
2LD, Vol. VI, JHN to Edward Churton (Nov. 21, 1837), 169-70; 169.
3LD, Vol. VI, JHN to R. F. Wilson (February 4, 1838), 196-97; 196.
4Morales, Newman (1801-1890), 93.
5LD, Vol. VI, JHN to Miss M. R. Giberne (Dec. 3, 1837), 173-74; 174.
6LD, Vol. VI, JHN to H. A. Woodgate (March 17, 1837), 44-45; 44.
7“Charge delivered to the Clergy of the Diocese of Exeter”, Phillipots (London 1836) cited in LD, Vol. VI, footnote, 13.
8LD, Vol. VI, JHN to Miss Holdsworth (Feb. 6, 1838), 197-99; 198.
9Ibid., 198.
10LD, Vol. VI, JHN to Hugh James Rose (July 8, 1838), 262-63; 263. At that period of time, Roman Catholic laity were not allowed to receive the chalice with the Precious Blood of Christ. Catholic doctrine teaches that in receiving Christ under one form or species, one receives the whole Christ, Body and Blood.
11“The Eucharistic Presence,” in PPS, Vol. VI, 141.
12Via Media, II, A Letter Addressed to the Rev. the Margaret Professor of Divinity on Mr. R. Hurrell Froude’s Statements Concerning the Holy Eucharist, n. 9, 211.
13Ibid., n. 6, 207.
14Ibid., n. 11, 206-17.
15VM, II, n. 13, 219-20.
16VM, II, n. 14, 221.
17Ibid., n. 10, 215
18VM, II, n. 22, 236-37.
19VM, II, footnote n. 5.
20Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica III, Q. 76, Art. 1, Ad. 3 (New York: Benzinger Brothers, Inc., 1947), Vol. 2, 2455.
21Both as an Anglican and later as a Catholic, Newman rejected a “physicalist” explanation of the Real Presence. His understanding of Christ’s spiritual presence would be commensurate with Aquinas’s understanding of the substantial presence (“by way of substance”). Cardinal Ratzinger explained the extremes that this view avoids. See Ratzinger, Joseph, “The Presence of the Lord” in God Is Near Us, Ignatius Press, San Francisco, 2003, 74–93, in particular 84–85.
22VM II,n. 10, 216.
23VM II, n. 23, 239.
24LD, Vol. VI, JHN to Mrs. John Mozley (June 5, 1838), 253-54; 254.
25Morales, Newman (1801-1890), 97.
26LD, Vol. VI, JHN to George Stanley Faber (April 11, 1838), 230-31; 231.
27“Difficulties in the Scripture Proof of the Creeds” in DA, 125.
28LD, Vol. VI, Extract of Bishop of Oxford’s Charge (August 14, 1838), 285-86.
29LD, Vol. VI, JHN to J. W. Bowden (August 17, 1838), 291-92; 291.
30Ibid., 291.
31LD, Vol. VI, Extract of J. W. Bowden to JHN (August 1838), 292.
32LD, Vol. VI, JHN to J. F. Christie (August 5, 1838), 278-79; 279.
33LD, Vol. VI, JHN to J. B. Mozley (August 10, 1838), 281-82; 282.
34John Henry Newman, PPS, Vol. IV, Dedication (Nov. 19, 1838).
35John Henry Newman, Hymni Ecclesiae, excerpti e Brevario Parisiensi, Preface, xiii.
36LD, Vol. VI, JHN to J. W. Bowden (November 21, 1838), 343-44; 344.
37Ibid., 348.
38Trevor, Newman, Pillar of the Cloud, 220-21.
39Via Media, Volume II, 256 (n. 35).