Chapter 33: Newman’s Essay on Development and His Final Conversion
CHAPTER 33
NEWMAN’S ESSAY ON DEVELOPMENT
AND HIS FINAL CONVERSION
NEWMAN had resigned from St. Mary’s in 1843, and during the second half of 1844, he ceased going to Oriel College. In 1845, he only went a few times and did not attend the Oriel election in March.1 Newman was ready to resign his Fellowship at Oriel, but before doing so he wanted to finish the book that he had begun. In writing this book he wished to test his ideas against the measure of Church History and to articulate the reasons for his convictions. He later wrote: “As I advanced, my difficulties had so cleared away that I ceased to speak of ‘the Roman Catholics,’ and boldly called them Catholics.”2
DEVELOPMENT OF CHRISTIAN DOCTRINE3
Although, when he finished his work on St. Athanasius in December 1844, he hoped to rest from writing, the idea of writing a new book weighed heavily upon him. He wrote to a friend:
And then I found all of a sudden this new work come before me, and I could not deny its claim on me. I have been thinking about some work or other since last March year [sic], and turning the subject in my mind at odd times—yet in spite of that, I have lost, if that is the word when it could not be helped, or rather consumed several months this Spring, in working upon it in ways which will not turn to any direct account.4
The previous year he had lost his good friend William Bowden and had suffered the anxiety of telling friends about his plan to become Roman Catholic. In the winter he had been ill with repeated bouts of influenza and had had many interruptions from the correspondence surrounding the February Convocation.5
By June 1845, Newman had worked for over four months on his new project and he had abundant material, but he needed to finish working out the principle of development—the subject upon which the book rested. He worked six to seven hours a day and finished three chapters out of a projected five. He rewrote every part but was still not satisfied with the results, or the progress. Newman did not want people to know that he was writing, but in June, an Oxford paper rumored that he was composing a manifesto before leaving the Anglican Church.6
Newman had been jotting notes for his book in his diary during 1844, and even earlier. He also kept a little notebook with thoughts for his new book. The notion that Christian doctrine develops through the centuries was one dealt with by authors as early as the Scholastic period. Newman had referred to the notion of development in his early writings. He wrote in one of the Tracts for the Times that the “articles of faith” which secure the Church’s purity from successive heresies and errors were all hidden in the Church’s bosom from the start and brought into form according to the occasion.7 In 1836, Newman answered the objection that the Church of Rome had departed from Primitive Christianity, for development of Gospel truths was also found in Anglicanism since the Anglican system itself is not found complete in the first Christian century.8
As a Tractarian, Newman claimed that the Anglican Church held the “note” of Apostolicity, or that it only taught the doctrines of the Church at the time of the Apostles. He held that the Roman Catholic Church held the “note” of catholicity or universality, which the Anglican did not. Newman, like others, initially thought that the Roman Catholics had added dogmas (such as Transubstantiation), practices (such as devotion to Mary and prayers to the saints), and the belief in Purgatory. Study of different fourth- to fifth-century heresies, however, led Newman to think that Rome, not Canterbury, had the “note” of Apostolicity, along with that of catholicity. Gradually, Newman began to consider that the doctrines and practices which he once believed were additions were actually authentic developments from Primitive Christianity.
Newman studied the notion of development and its implication for an understanding of Revelation more than any earlier persons had done before him. In one of his most original sermons from the University Sermons, Newman indicated that developments were not simply explanations of doctrines already formulated but new doctrines that arose from the original dogmas.9
During the year 1845, Newman refined the idea of development in doctrine and Church practices and tested the idea against the history of Christianity. In the first edition, published in December of the same year, he spoke of “tests” to examine whether a doctrine is a true development or a corruption of Primitive Christianity. He explained to Pusey that “One age corrects the expressions and statements of even the Saints of the foregoing.” Unless the theory of development were accepted, general skepticism would follow. Since saints and theologians had contradicted each other, people might conclude that religious truth is arbitrary. At the same time, Newman reasoned that if development were correct, there would be no reason to stop with the English Church. He wrote: “I cannot hold precisely what the English holds and nothing more. I must go forward or backward—else I sink into a deep skepticism, a heartless acedia, into which too many in Oxford, I fear, are sinking.”10
Newman wrote to a friend: “I cannot make out why I am to believe just what the English Church allows me to believe and nothing more. The early ages of the Church seem to me to have taught either more or less—less if we ask for a very rigid proof of what they held, more if we are content with rough and general proofs—but in no case as we teach in England.”11
He perceived that the teaching of the Church grows as a child grows to become a man. To live is to grow, to develop; “In a higher world it is otherwise, but here below to live is to change, and to be perfect is to have changed often.”12 Doctrines are ideas that are alive and have the power to influence people. These ideas are developed by communities of men and their leaders in a complex interplay with other people and their ideas. An idea “grows when it incorporates, and its identity is found, not in isolation, but in continuity and sovereignty. This it is that imparts to the history both of states and of religions, its special turbulent and polemical character. Such is the explanation of the wranglings, whether of schools or of parliaments.”13
In his book, Newman pointed out that the philosopher Joseph De Maistre and theologian Johannes Mohler had written about the increase and expansion of the Christian Creed and ritual over 1800 years. He agreed with them that from the nature of the human mind, time is necessary for the full comprehension and perfection of great ideas; and that the highest and most wonderful truths, though communicated to the world once for all by inspired teachers, could not be comprehended all at once by the recipients, but, as being received and transmitted by minds not inspired and through media which were human, have required only the longer time and deeper thought for their full elucidation.14
Newman called this “the theory of Development of Doctrine,” a theory to explain the “necessary and anxious problem” posed by the 300 years of the Protestant Reformation.
As a historian of Church doctrines Newman articulated what he perceived to be seven “tests” or “notes” to distinguish true development in the history of Christianity from corruption. These notes verify the unity and identity of an idea, or doctrine, through all the stages of its development. Newman explained:
To guarantee its own substantial unity, it must be seen to be one in type, one in its systems of principles, one in its unitive power toward externals, one in its logical consecutiveness, one in the witness of its early phases to its later, one in the protection which its later extend to its earlier, and one it its vigour with continuance, that is, in its tenacity.15
The first “note” Newman studied, preservation of type or identity, was the view people had of Christianity in the first five centuries. He indicated how in each of these centuries, the Church was a religious community, claiming a divine commission and holding its surrounding bodies to be heretical. The Church was a well-organized and disciplined body, spread throughout the world. It was considered a natural enemy to governments, an intolerant force, and a society that breaks laws and divides families. It was accused of being superstitious and responsible for foul crimes. It was likened to many sects. Throughout these five centuries, the Church maintained the same identity in the eyes of external observers.16 The pagan writers Tacitus, Seutonius, and Pliny associated Christianity with the Oriental superstitions that were extending throughout the empire.17 These heathen rites had some external similarity with Christianity. Later on Celsus and Porphyry confused Christianity with Gnosticism.18
These Roman philosophers and authors considered Christianity and many Oriental sects a threat to the cohesion of the Empire; they frowned on its ascetical discipline, initiation rites, concern for proselytism and what they mistakenly thought was a somber view of life and sins. Christianity was seen as “a religion which men hate as proselytizing, anti-social, revolutionary, as dividing families, separating chief friends, corrupting the maxims of government, making a mock at law, dissolving the empire, the enemy of human nature, and a ‘conspirator against its rights and privileges …’”19
This was the identity of Christianity throughout its first centuries, which had continued into the nineteenth century. The Roman Catholic Church, which claims continuity with early Christianity, was characterized in modern times in the same way as it had been characterized in the first centuries. In the fourth century, when Christianity became the imperial religion, it kept its identity, but it was no longer compared with the Oriental sects; rather, it was compared to the Manichean religion and many Christian sects such as the Arians, Donatists, and Apollinarians. Externally, there were some similarities between the Church and these Christian sects, but the Church professed Apostolic Succession and obedience to the Bishop of Rome. The Church was known for a zealous adherence to its own creed and an intolerant view of what it considered error. Newman explained, “In one point alone the heresies seem universally to have agreed,—in hatred to the Church.”20 She was called a seducer, harlot, apostate, Antichrist and devil by heretics. Its opponents continually subdivided into many other sects while it remained one. “The Church is everywhere, but it is one; sects are everywhere, but they are many, independent and discordant.”21 A few heresies became widespread, yet they were only the same in name, for in no two places were they the same in their beliefs and practices, and unlike the Church Fathers none claimed the name “Catholic” for itself.
Newman illustrated the preservation of type or identity between the Catholic Church in modern times and the Church of the fifth and sixth centuries of Christianity. When Arianism spread among the Vandals in Africa, the Visigoths in France and Spain, the Ostrogoths in Italy, and the Suevi in Portugal, Arians robbed the Catholics of their churches and the treasures of their shrines, yet they never claimed the title “Catholic,” and they called Catholics by the name “Romans.”22 Newman saw the parallel between the Catholic Church of early Christianity and that of modern times. The English Church, like Arianism, was a heretical body in the state of schism under the patronage of the monarchy.
In the fifth and sixth centuries the test of catholicity did not suffice to refute heresy. The Arian and Nestorian heresies, based on the literal interpretation of Scripture, led to serious errors about the Divinity of Christ and Mary’s role as Mother of God. When the Monophysite heresy arose the Imperial Court supported Eutyches, the originator of the error, and the emperor convoked a general council of the Church’s bishops to decide the doctrinal question. After a violent council, which ended with the murder of the patriarch of Constantinople, the Monophysites had their way for a short time until Pope St. Leo, Bishop of Rome, set matters straight. St. Peter Chrysologus urged Eutyches, “submit yourself in everything of what has been written by the blessed Pope of Rome; for St. Peter, who lives and presides in his own See, gives the true faith to those who seek it.”23 Leo convoked the Council of Chalcedon which met on October 8, 451 and was attended by the largest number of bishops of any Council before. At Chalcedon, the doctrine of Christ’s dual nature and the power of the Bishop of Rome, based on the succession from St. Peter, was reaffirmed by the bishops. Newman commented that despite the errors of bishops within the Church, frequent heresies, the occupation of its churches and oppressions of its people, “there is but one Voice for whose decisions the people wait with trust, one Name and one See to which they look with hope, and that name Peter, and that See Rome …”24
Examining the record of history, Newman had proven to his satisfaction the identity of the modern Roman Catholic Church with Christianity of the first six centuries. The developments in those centuries, like the role of papal power, catholicity as a test of authentic Christianity, the practice of correcting heresies with excommunication (the exclusion from ecclesial communion), and reliance on Church Fathers for the interpretation of Scriptures, were still maintained in the nineteenth century. The same false accusations and the claim that the Church of Rome was the Antichrist, as well as persecution by governments, were also maintained by its opponents in the nineteenth century.
In his Essay on Development, Newman examined from a historical point of view a whole series of other subjects, such as Purgatory, the practice of sacramental Confession, Indulgences, Prayer for the Dead, Prayer to the Saints, Devotion to the Mother of God, and the Mass. He dedicated the majority, though, to establishing the identity of the modern Roman Church with the ancient one. In 1845, one of the principal thoughts on his mind was that the Church of England was heretical; it had fallen into schism as had so many other bodies in early Christianity. Newman wished to live and die in the Church founded by Christ upon the Apostles.
The rest of Newman’s essay dealt with other important elements, even though he did not elaborate on them as much. To explain the second note of true development, or continuity of principles, Newman enumerated nine principles that he derived from the Incarnation, the central truth of Christianity: dogma as definitive and necessary, the supremacy of faith, the principle of theology, the sacramental principle (God’s revelation of Himself through the material and visible as in the Incarnation), the mystical sense of Scripture, the principle of grace whereby God makes us like Himself, asceticism, the evil of sin, and the sanctification of matter. Each of these principles had been vigorously maintained in the Church at all times.25 Later Newman considered that the theory of development was itself another principle. This principle gave character to the whole course of Christian thought. “It was discernible from the first years of Catholic teaching up to the present day, and gave to the teaching a unity and individuality.”26 Newman explained that principles give rise to doctrines and illustrated how the principles of the early Church were the same as those of the later Church, so that even though there were variations in belief, the similarity was greater than the difference.27
On the other hand, Newman noted that heretics violated these principles. The Arians and Nestorians denied the allegorical rule of interpreting Scripture; the Gnostics substituted knowledge for faith, and most violated the dogmatic and sacramental principles.28 Newman asserted that in modern times Protestantism likewise had reversed the principles of Catholic theology, such as the dogmatic principle, the mystical interpretation of Scripture, and the sacramental principle.
In the Essay on Development, Newman hardly referred to the Holy Mass, but in March, as he began to write the Essay, he told Pusey that Our Lord could grant His grace through the sacramental rites of the English Church.29 Newman thought that even though a Church was schismatic, Christ made Himself present on its altars if it had Apostolic Succession and the true form of Consecration. Newman told Maria Giberne that prior to St. Augustine, who expounded a theory on sacraments administered to heretics, there had been a controversy over the validity of Baptism performed by heretical clergy.30 St. Cyprian had argued that those baptisms were invalid. St. Stephen, Pope at the time of St. Cyprian, instead had taught that those baptisms were valid and should not be repeated if they were properly administered. The teaching of the Pope once again had prevailed.
St. Augustine had taught that for a sacrament to be valid the minister must be validly ordained and the matter and form of the sacraments must be correct. Each sacrament requires a given element (matter) and precise words (form). This teaching applied not only to Baptism, but also to the other sacraments. With regard to the Mass, if a minister was rightly ordained, the Holy Eucharist contains the Real Presence of Christ. Schism produces an obstacle or obex for grace to flow to the recipient. In the case of infant Baptism, for instance, the obex of being part of a heretical body was removed when the children conformed to the Church, or when they received the sacrament of Confirmation. Newman believed that in the case of the Eucharist, the obex is solved by love. If someone is within a schismatic Church due to invincible ignorance and that person adores Christ, the grace of the Eucharist flows into that person’s soul.31
As an Anglican, Newman grew in his appreciation and love for the Holy Eucharist. In 1837, he had begun to celebrate a weekly Communion Service. In 1838, Newman spoke about the sacrificial character of the Mass as verified in the ancient prayers of the liturgy. He reasoned that a priest and a sacrifice called for an altar, more than a table. But Newman soon came to appreciate the complete rite of the Mass and its beauty even more. In 1846, Newman wrote his novel, Loss and Gain, a fictional account based on his conversion. The novel had as one of its poignant scenes the first time the protagonist enters a Roman Catholic Church during the Sacrifice of the Mass. The convert in the novel conveyed his awe:
I declare … to me nothing is so consoling, so piercing, so thrilling, so overcoming as the Mass, said as it is among us. I could attend Mass forever and not be tired. It is not a mere form of words—it is a great action, the greatest action that can be on earth. It is, not the invocation merely, but, if I dare use the word, the evocation of the Eternal. He becomes present on the altar in flesh and blood, before whom angels bow and devils tremble. This is that awful event which is the scope, and is the interpretation, of every part of the solemnity.32
Newman was not the only one concerned about the validity of the Anglican sacraments. Miss Jane Parker, a friend of T. W. Allies who wished to become Roman Catholic, also asked Newman about the validity of the Eucharist in the Anglican Church. Though Newman thought that the Anglican Church was in schism, he believed that by an extraordinary mercy, the grace of the sacraments could be transmitted to the recipients of the holy elements. Newman also believed in the validity of sacramental Confession in the Anglican Church. In the spring of 1844, when Allies visited Newman for sacramental Confession, he left a record of the visit: “As I walked over I could not think how great was the privilege to be near and to have means of intercourse with the greatest man the English Church in her separated state has ever produced, and a saint.”33
One of the last questions that Newman had trouble understanding before becoming Roman Catholic was the Church’s belief and veneration of the Virgin Mary. A gradual development in Newman’s devotion to the Virgin can be divided into four periods.34 During a first period, until 1834, the central role of Mary in the mystery of the Incarnation led Newman to doctrinal veneration of the Virgin Mother. In a second period, until 1837, he accepted the difference between intercession and invocation of Mary and the saints. This was a distinction tacitly recognized by the Articles; intercession was allowed, whereas invocation was condemned. At first Newman thought that invocation of the saints was not practiced in early Christianity. He thought that it obscured the unique mediation of Christ and that it could lead to idolatry. When he and his companions at Littlemore prayed the Divine Office they refrained from praying ora pro nobis (pray for us) and instead prayed oret pro nobis (may she intercede for us), and they omitted the ancient hymn Salve Regina. Out of obedience to the Anglican Church, Newman followed Anglican practice until his reception into the Roman Church. In a third period, from 1837 to 1839, he condemned as unscriptural her external veneration by modern Catholics, yet his own veneration for her continued to grow. In a last period, from 1839 to 1845, as Newman’s understanding of true doctrinal development and practices grew, he finally understood and accepted modern Catholic veneration of the Virgin Mary.
Some of the last pages of the Essay on Development were dedicated to the development of Christian belief and devotion to saints (to the Blessed Virgin Mary in particular). By studying the ante-Nicene Fathers, St. Justin, St. Irenaeus, and Tertullian, Newman came to realize that already in the second and third centuries, the Fathers spoke of the Blessed Virgin Mary as the New Eve, and gave her a singular type of honor as the Mother of the New Adam.35 As an illustration of the sixth note of true development, the conservative action of development on earlier doctrine, Newman asserted that devotion to the Mother of God provides protection and confirmation about the Divinity of her Son.36
Devotion to the Mother of God was no longer an obstacle for Newman. In the Apologia he later wrote:
The idea of the Blessed Virgin was as it were magnified in the Church of Rome as time went on,—but so were all the Christian ideas; as that of the Blessed Eucharist. The whole scene of pale, faint, distant Apostolic Christianity is seen in Rome, as through a telescope or magnifier. The harmony of the whole, however, is of course what it was. It is unfair then to take one Roman idea, that of the Blessed Virgin, out of what may be called its context.37
By mid-1845 Newman no longer had any intellectual doubts about Roman Catholic doctrine, yet while he labored over the Essay on Development, his family and friends continued to give him unsolicited suggestions and advice against his intended step.
FAMILY AND FRIENDS
Newman’s family, except for Jemima, was not able to understand his reasons for reception into the Catholic Church. Newman remained in contact with Jemima and, on a lesser scale, with Harriet. He had very little contact with Charles, who early in the year wrote from Germany asking for money after having been in a debtors’ prison. Early in 1845, Charles wrote Frank from Bonn: “I believe almost the whole family is in a false position from not finding proper society; only, I am more aware of this than others; and I am less mad, because I admit I am mad. My madness takes a different turn from yours and John’s.”38 On the assumption that John Henry’s income would decrease significantly upon becoming Roman Catholic, Frank offered to take wholly upon himself the care for their Aunt Elizabeth and for Charles. Frank also offered John Henry to come to visit, or stay at his home for as long he needed, or wished.39 It was a generous offer although not without a tinge of condescension and a show of disregard for Roman Catholicism.
False reports and rumors about Newman continued throughout the year. His friend Albany J. Christie reported to him that some people were calling him (Newman) a skeptic. Newman wrote to Christie to refute the calumny and to explain that he had never felt the temptation to skepticism.40 Newman anticipated that some, if not many, would take the step toward Rome with him, but he thought the Church of England would be seriously affected when the Protestant party succeeded in throwing out its antagonists, the Tractarians: “I suppose there will be a dreadful move toward liberalism.”41 According to Newman the Bishops of Exeter and London were enforcing stricter rubrics as long as they could cast aside Catholic doctrines and principles. They allowed for the use of a surplice by the priest, but they did not acknowledge that an altar implies that the Mass is a sacrifice.42
Defending himself from false rumors did not diminish Newman’s charity toward his friends and neighbors. Newman did more than theorize about theology and history; he genuinely lived by the spirit of the Gospel. The practice of charity characterized his relations with others. In 1845, his diary and correspondence indicate that he followed with charitable interest the lives of some youths whom he knew. Henry William Weltch, a nephew of Ambrose St. John, was a young lad whom Newman had tutored in Euclid and Greek at Littlemore since 1843. In January 1845, Newman arranged for the young man to study at St. Mark’s College, the National Society’s Training Institution for Schoolmasters.43 Newman took a great deal of interest in the lad’s progress in London, and Henry William was in turn grateful to Newman and kept him abreast of his progress.44 Another youth who was the object of Newman’s concern and affection was his godson, Octavius Ogle. When he became a young man, Newman wrote to him and sent him one of his books.45 During 1845, Newman also followed with concern the health of Marianne, one of Bowden’s daughters, then confined to bed for months due to an ailment of her hip.
In his conversations and letters there was no bitterness toward his Anglican brothers or animosity toward the bishops. Although he was frank and privately criticized what he thought mistaken, Newman practiced charity in dealings with others, with the occasional intemperate response to an annoying correspondent as the exception. Newman’s charity was evident in his understanding for those who had not, like him, received the spiritual and intellectual grace to believe the Church of Rome to be the true Church.
Not all, however, was false rumors regarding his conversion and other contradictions; Newman had good friends who valued him greatly and spared no expense to show their love for him. In the early nineteenth century, when only wealthy or important persons had their portraits made, Wilberforce, recognizing the importance of his good friend, commissioned two portraits of him. In May, Newman went to London and sat on three different days for a portrait by Sir W. Ross, a miniature painter. In July, he visited Mrs. Bowden and Mrs. Wood in London and sat for Sir Ross again. During the same visit to London he sat for a portrait by George Richmond, also commissioned by Henry Wilberforce.
On his return to Littlemore, Newman heard of the death of Miss Lenthall. For over a year Newman had paid weekly visits to Miss Lenthall, a parishioner of St. Mary’s in Oxford, who was ill. Newman read prayers with her and took her Holy Communion. When she died on July 21, 1845, Newman told Pusey about the news: “I have just heard it—it has affected me much—she is my last link with St. Mary’s.”46
MORE REACTIONS FROM FRIENDS
AND WELL-WISHERS
As the year 1845 advanced, Newman’s friends began to accept the inevitable end of his spiritual journey, albeit with varying reactions. Pusey, who had tried to deny the reality of Newman’s step, began to accept it and to put on a good face. Newman wrote a friend about Pusey, “[H]e is trying to smooth it over—as if it involved no great separation.”47 But for Pusey and Keble, who knew and loved Newman so well, the loss would be great. Both had prayed that their friend would not leave the Anglican Communion, but were finally accepting of what would happen in some months’ time.
On June 17, Gladstone met with Judge Coleridge, Robert Wilberforce, and Manning to discuss Newman’s intended step. They wished Newman to be received into the Catholic Church outside of England, and wrote to Pusey and Keble to convince Newman to do so.48 Newman mused, “Can it be for any reason except to hide my thinking the English Church in Schism?”49 Newman thought going abroad to be received would misrepresent him in such a solemn act. When he pressed for the reason, he found out that their plan was for him to leave England for good. Surprised, he wrote, “I could hardly help saying how cool.”50 Newman told Mrs. Bowden about this and argued that if the Church of England were not the lawful authority, why should he go abroad?51 He would no longer be accountable to the Anglican Church.
The efforts of those trying to dissuade Newman from becoming Roman Catholic multiplied. He was often amused by what people wrote to him in letters, but at times, he expressed annoyance. One letter occasioned an entertaining reaction on Newman’s part. John William Burgon, a graduate from Worcester College and winner of the Newdigate prize for the best composition in English verse, wrote Newman a very long letter exhorting him to remain in the Anglican Communion. Newman remarked, “Mr. Burgon has sent me a sermon, very well meant. It should have been in verse. You know he has got the Newdigate.”52 Burgon, who also went to Littlemore to “preach” to Newman, told him that by becoming Roman Catholic, he would undo all that he had done through his writing.
One whose efforts met a less gracious, but humorous, response was Tresham Dames Gregg, an Anglican clergy man in Ireland, who tried to scare Newman with the degrading character of popery in Ireland. Gregg had sent Newman a borrowed copy of a book by Joseph Meade, who regarded the Pope to be the Antichrist. Newman replied that since he had not asked for the book and had enough books to read himself, and since Meade wished the book back, he would lose no time in returning it.53
Newman had various strangers writing or calling on him to advise him against leaving the Anglican Church. One of these strangers who went to Littlemore even resorted to indecency, claiming that on account of madness in his family, Newman should not leave the Church of England.54 Another stranger wrote Newman that people err by mistaking what their duty is, and exhorted him not to travel faster than God would ordain.55 Newman sent a terse reply to the author of the letter telling him to treat others with reverence, and not to advise others without good knowledge of them.56 The gentleman sent an apology to Newman, who then in turn replied kindly.57
Richard Westamacott, a classmate of Newman’s from childhood days at the Ealing School, also tried to dissuade Newman from his plans. In this case, Newman thanked his friend and explained to him the reasons for his plans to join the Roman Catholic Church.58 Westamacott replied, “We shall have to avoid one subject—but I cannot forget you are an old schoolfellow, and have been my good friend for many a long year—and so let us go on through life thinking kindly of, and wishing well to each other.”59
NEWMAN’S LAST MONTHS AS AN ANGLICAN
After all those attempts to dissuade Newman, the Anglican clergyman made his last farewells. At the start of August, Newman thanked his sister, Jemima, for speaking with their Aunt Elizabeth about his impending step.60 Newman had a close tie with his aunt and was sorry to cause her pain. Later in the month, he told Jemima that the appearance of his book would be a signal of “his going.”61 Writing the Essay was taking a toll on Newman, and upon the news of the death of Edward Elmes, a clergyman who had once been a master at the school in Ealing, Newman told his sister that he felt old. He confided that the book that he was writing was “a work of labour and pain” to him.62 He had rewritten the last chapter a few times and was still dissatisfied with it. Newman closed the letter to Jemima with the wish: “May I never lose your esteem and approbation, as I think I never shall lose your love!”63 He never lost her love, but once he became Roman Catholic their correspondence lost its intimacy; she shut out of her life everything connected with Newman’s new life.64
Later in the month, he wrote Maria Giberne that the sign of his going over would be the resignation of the Fellowship at Oriel, probably in October, but he did not think he would finish the book by then.65 In any case, he thought his change would be soon, whether before or after the publication of his book. He had tried to tell only his close friends about the book he had written and instructed the publisher not to let the printer know the name of the author until the release of the book. Newman sought some peace and quiet from intruders. Understandably, he shunned being the object of curiosity and idle public scrutiny in the newspapers.
In August, Frank wrote John Henry again, but this time to make the ridiculous suggestion that he form an Anglo-Episcopal Free Church with a succession of bishops derived from New York or Scotland. This church would later be a means to union with Rome.66 John Henry replied that he thought the Roman Church to be the only true religion and the English Church to be in schism.67 He was not going to Rome because he thought that particular religion more bearable, or because of some other personal fancy. Newman added that except for involuntary ignorance, there is no salvation outside the Church of Rome.68 Newman jotted down a comment on his brother’s letter to him: “That I could be contemplating questions of Truth and Falsehood never entered into his imagination!”69 For Newman the change of religion was a matter of religious truth of the utmost importance, not a strategy in religious affairs.
On August 9, Dr. Wiseman, Catholic Bishop for the Central District of England, visited Newman at Littlemore, but the subject of their conversation was never made public. Some months earlier, Wiseman had written to Newman, who had replied with greater warmth than he had any time earlier.70 Newman explained that his “cold and formal” tone in previous correspondence had been due to the position he had as an Anglican clergyman. Newman had felt that to act otherwise was to betray a sacred obligation and obedience to his own bishop; however, Newman wished to apologize and express his esteem for Wiseman.
Wiseman had expected Newman to be received into the Church in February 1845, but when the month passed by, he had grown impatient. Some from old Catholic families maliciously suggested that Newman would not convert.71 Wiseman did not wish to embarrass Newman by a personal visit, so he sent Bernard Smith to visit him at Littlemore. Newman invited Smith to dinner, and at the time for the meal, Newman appeared dressed as a layman. Smith knew that this was Newman’s avowal to him and to Wiseman of the impending move. Smith reported it to Wiseman, who failed to see the meaning of the sign.72 Even so, Dr. Wiseman would soon have the long-awaited joy of Newman’s reception into the Catholic Church. As a Roman Catholic, Newman would fall under Wiseman’s jurisdiction.
In August, Newman met in Oxford with Lady Georgiana Fullerton, whose husband had been received into the Roman Church in 1843.73 Lady Georgiana, who was a novelist, biographer, and poet, would follow her husband into the Church in March 1846. Also in August, Newman corresponded with a woman whose identity was kept anonymous, and who also sought his advice. Newman no longer abstained from giving advice in favor of the Roman Catholic Church. The anonymous woman had been presented with some historical arguments against the orthodoxy of Pope Honorius I.74 Newman told his correspondent that she was not prepared to judge the historicity of the arguments. He explained, “No truth, no conclusion about what is true, is without its difficulties. You must give up faith, if you will not believe till all objections are first solved.”75 Instead of examining questions beyond her competence she should take the general view of Catholicism and Anglicanism and consider which answers better to the idea of a Divine Messenger, and which has always spoken to the whole world with authority.
On August 24, Newman attended the Sunday Communion Service at the church in Littlemore, but did not receive the Sacrament. He was taking yet another step before his final move. The next day, Fr. Randal Lythgoe, the Provincial of the English Province of the Jesuit Fathers, stopped to visit Newman. The diary entry for that day reads: “Mr. Lythgoe called—I did not see him.”76 Even though he was about to make his move, he wished to do it as quietly as possible. He had met Wiseman, whom he had known for a long time, but it was not the same with Fr. Lythgoe, to whom Newman wrote to apologize that “his circumstances should have prevented” their meeting.77
At the start of September, William George Ward and his wife wrote to Newman, informing him that they would be received into the Roman Catholic Church at the Jesuit Chapel in Bolton Street, London. William G. Ward had been almost literally pushed out of the Anglican Church when he was censured by Oxford University and deprived of his degree. Despite this injustice, which also deprived him of an ecclesiastical license, his joining the Roman Catholic Church was labeled a secession from the Anglican Church. Mrs. Ward told Newman of the great peace and joy that both she and her husband had experienced that very day in joining the Catholic Church. She wished to thank Newman for the valuable help that he had given to her through his writings and advice.78 After teaching theology at St. Edmund’s College in Hertfordshire, he later became editor of the Dublin Review, an influential Catholic journal.
In September, Simeon Lloyd Pope, one of Newman’s contemporaries at Oxford, wrote, asking Newman to disavow the rumors that he had heard about his intentions. Newman replied to his friend that no one had a right to be surprised. Two years earlier, he had resigned from St. Mary’s (September 18, 1843), and almost a year earlier he had made public his intentions through some friends. Newman repeated to Pope what he had written to Frank: “I am convinced that (to those who are enlightened see it) the Church of Rome is the only place of salvation. I do not think I can remain outside of it, and yet remain in God’s favor.”79 Newman considered that he had spent seven years in probation. During that time he had fulfilled his duty as an Anglican clergyman to teach Anglican doctrines and support the Church of England. His love for the truth and his conscience did not allow him to continue in the same situation any longer.
For Newman, reception into the Catholic Church had become a matter of duty. He was impelled by his conscience to remain no longer an Anglican. Newman had moved from reasoned arguments in favor of the Roman Catholic Church to a serious sense of duty to act according to his convictions. He believed that given his knowledge of Revelation and religious truths, he endangered his eternal salvation by not fully embracing these truths. He was, however, cognizant that this step was not an obligation for others without sufficient knowledge of the truth and the necessary divine grace.
Reception into the Catholic Church of a baptized person consisted, as it does today, in a profession of faith, sacramental Confession with absolution of sins, and the reception of two other sacraments: First Communion and Confirmation.80 Reports of Anglicans from the upper social classes and clergy who were becoming Roman Catholics began to increase. The Tablet, a Catholic periodical, reported on September 20 that Mr. and Mrs. Ward were received into the Church.81 Bishop Wiseman confirmed the Wards at St. Mary’s College, Oscott. The news report mentioned former Anglican clergymen who were at Oscott: Spencer, Talbot, Bernard Smith, Montgomery, and Capes. The article asserted that Newman would soon convert and no longer wished that his intention should be kept secret.
Toward the end of September, events at Littlemore quickly unfolded; Newman’s young companions were unable to restrain any longer their eagerness to be received into the Church. On the twentieth, John Dalgairns wrote to Fr. Dominic Barbieri, asking to be received into the Roman Catholic Church. Fr. Dominic, who had prayed and offered many sacrifices to God for this intention, replied, praising God and inviting Dalgairns to Aston, a Passionist house just outside Birmingham. Fr. Dominic sent regards to Dalgairns’s “holy companions” at Littlemore. An exultant Fr. Dominic continued:
Dear Littlemore, I love thee! A little more still and we shall see happy results from Littlemore. When the learned and holy Superior of Littlemore will come, then I hope we shall see the beginning of a new era. Yes, we shall see again the happy days of Augustine, of Lanfranc, and Thomas. England will once more be the Isle of Saints, and the nurse of new Christian nations destined to carry the light of the Gospels coram gentibus et regibus et filiis Israel.82
In the second half of September, Newman sent the Essay on the Development of Christian Doctrine to Toovey and reviewed proofs. He asked Robert F. Wilson, Keble’s curate, to tell Keble that he had sent his book to the press and would soon resign his Fellowship. Wilson, like so many others, asked Newman about the step he was to take and whether the Anglican Orders would be valid. Newman replied that his conviction about the truth of the Church had grown over the years. He would not bargain, or ask for concessions about Anglican Orders: “If I believe the One Church is infallible in doctrine, and to be obeyed in all things, how can I be asking a point in detail, such as whether she receives Anglican Orders? Far deeper feelings ought to be urging me on, or I ought not to move at all.”83
Within one week, there was a flurry of conversions to Roman Catholicism from the group at Littlemore. On September 27, Dalgairns traveled to Aston House to be received by Fr. Dominic on Michaelmas Day. Ambrose St. John gave up his scholarship at Christ Church College and left for Prior Park College, near Bath, where he would be received into the Church on October 2. Christie left for London, where he in turn would be received into the Church on October 18.
On October 2, Richard Stanton wrote Newman, asking him where he should go to be received into the Church. Stanton wished to avoid the notoriety of Oscott and thought of going to Stonyhurst College, a Jesuit school, or to Aston House.84 Newman replied that he expected to be received into the Church by Fr. Dominic at Littlemore and welcomed Stanton to join him. Stanton was very grateful for Newman’s invitation and decided to join him at Littlemore.
Finally, on October 3, Newman wrote to Provost Edward Hawkins, resigning from his Fellowship at Oriel. He wrote to Pusey, Elizabeth Bowden, Christie, Mrs. William Froude, Mr. Phillips, Jemima, and Henry Wilberforce to inform them what he had done. Mrs. Bowden replied, “[W]e must hope you will still be allowed to guide and benefit us who yet remain—it is impossible not to be sadly perplexed and every month adds to my perplexity—yet I cannot feel that I should be right in changing now, and so I hope and pray that the right way may in some way become more clear before us …”85 She added, “I would not give up the right, if I may say so, to talk to you.”86 Mrs. Elizabeth Bowden would see her way to the Church of Rome in 1846.
On October 3, Keble began a letter to Newman that he was only able to finish on October 11, at midnight, since his wife was gravely ill. Besides thanking Newman for praying for his wife, Keble described Newman’s departure as an expected thunderbolt. Keble felt grief for losing a guide and a helper, but he wrote to express his love to his friend:
My dearest Newman you have been a kind and helpful friend to me in a way in which scarce any one else could have been and you are so mixed up in my mind with old and dear and sacred thoughts, that I cannot well bear to part with you: most unworthy as I know myself to be: and yet I cannot go along with you: I must cling to the belief that we are not really parted …87
AT LAST, FULL COMMUNION WITH
THE CATHOLIC CHURCH
October 5 was a Sunday and Newman stayed indoors all day preparing for a general confession of his sins prior to his reception into the Church. He marked the diary entry with a cross. On the sixth, Newman completed the advertisement for his Essay on the Development of Christian Doctrine. The book remained unfinished, and would be published in this state before the end of the year.
William Faber wrote to Newman on the fifth, confiding his affection for Rome and his attraction to its doctrines. Faber had some doubts about the need to remain where God had placed him, as Pusey enjoined him to do, and he wished Newman’s advice. A few weeks later, in November, Faber was received into the Church of Rome at Northampton by Bishop William Wareing, Vicar Apostolic of the Eastern District.
On the afternoon of the eighth, Dalgairns, who had returned to be with Newman at Littlemore, went out to meet Fr. Dominic at the Angel, the Oxford coach stop. Only then did Newman tell Dalgairns his precise intention to be received into the Church. The coach was delayed by the weather, and Fr. Dominic, who had been five hours on the top of the coach, was soaked.88 They took a chaise to Littlemore, where they arrived at about eleven at night. While Fr. Dominic sat down by the fire to dry his clothes, Newman entered the room. Fr. Dominic later wrote to his superiors:
The door opened—and what a spectacle it was for me to see at my feet John Henry Newman begging me to hear his confession and admit him into the bosom of the Catholic Church! And there by the fire he began his general confession with extraordinary humility and devotion.89
Newman began his confession that night and completed it on the following day, Thursday, October 9. That day, Fr. Dominic also heard the confessions of Richard Stanton and Frederick Bowles. Then at six in the evening, before an overjoyed priest who gave them a conditional Baptism, each made his profession of faith. On the following day, Fr. Dominic said Mass at Littlemore, using a writing desk as an altar, and he gave Communion to those present. Newman had written the Essay on the Development of Christian Doctrine on this very desk. John Henry Newman, the 44-year-old Oxford scholar and leader of the Oxford Movement, was at last a Roman Catholic, received into the Church without public spectacle in the quiet village of his former Anglican parish.
In the novel Loss and Gain, which was Newman’s first work as a Roman Catholic, he described his own sentiments about reception into the Church of Rome:
A VERY few words will conduct us to the end of our history. It was Sunday morning about seven o’clock, and Charles had been admitted into the communion of the Catholic Church about an hour since. He was still kneeling in the church of the Passionists before the Tabernacle, in the possession of a deep peace and serenity of mind, which he had not thought possible on earth. It was more like the stillness which almost sensibly affects the ears when a bell that has long been tolling stops, or when a vessel, after much tossing at sea, finds itself in harbour. It was such as to throw him back in memory on his earliest years, as if he were really beginning life again. But there was more than the happiness of childhood in his heart; he seemed to feel a rock under his feet; it was the soliditas Cathedræ Petri. He went on kneeling, as if he were already in Heaven, with the throne of God before him, and angels around, and as if to move were to lose his privilege.90
Before leaving Littlemore, Fr. Dominic walked to see the Woodmasons, one of the two families that had made Littlemore more genteel. Mathias Woodmason, his wife, and two daughters were received that day into the Church of Rome. Their son Charles was received at St. Mary’s College, Oscott, in November.
The Italian Passionist had never before seen “any monastery so poor,” and he gave Newman a rule of life with less austerities than he and his companions had been practicing.91 Fr. Dominic wrote of Newman to his superiors: “In my judgment he is one of the most humble and lovable men I have met in my life.”92 At the same time, Newman wrote of him to Mrs. Bowden: “I wish all persons were as charitable as he. I believe he is a very holy man.” Newman saw Fr. Dominic only a few times more before his death in 1849. Thirty years after Dominic’s death, Newman testified for Dominic’s process of canonization:
Father Dominic was a marvelous missioner filled with zeal. He had a great part in my own conversion and in that of others. His very look had about it something holy. When his form came into sight, I was moved to the depths in the strangest way. The gaiety and affability of his manner in the midst of all his sanctity was itself a holy sermon.93
On Sunday, October 12, the five converts: Newman, St. John, Dalgairns, Stanton, and Bowles, walked to St. Clement’s, the Catholic chapel at Oxford, to attend Mass. Newman had prepared his friends and readers, yet he had evaded the curiosity of the press. For Newman, reception into the Roman Catholic Church was not a victory, but rather like a ship coming out of rough waters to port. It brought the peace that follows accomplishment of duty. Many people wrote Newman to congratulate him or to express their perplexity. Many criticized him, and others said that he would convert back to the Anglican Church. Some were happy to see him go. Keble and Pusey both wrote beautiful letters to their friend. Pope Gregory XVI sent his Apostolic Blessing, which served as a consolation during the loneliness that Newman soon experienced at Littlemore after the severing of many friendships.
Newman would not see some of his good friends for a very long time; many of his friendships were interrupted for years. Newman’s friendships with Keble and Pusey also suffered. In 1865, Newman visited Keble at his home in Hursley and unexpectedly met Pusey there; they had not seen each other since 1846. The three had aged; initially Newman and Keble had not even recognized one another at the door. The three spent four hours together. At intervals, while Keble attended on his sick wife, Pusey and Newman spoke alone. Later when Pusey went to read the Evening Service in Church, Keble and Newman spent some time alone. Newman described the scene to a friend: “We walked a little way, and stood looking in silence at the church and churchyard, so beautiful and calm. Then he began to converse with more than his old tone of intimacy, as if we had never been parted, and soon I was obliged to go …”94 After their reunion, Keble wrote Newman many notes. In one he quoted from Macbeth: “When shall we three meet again? … When the hurlyburly’s done. When the battle’s lost and won.”95
Newman’s love for the truth had prevailed over many previous prejudices in religion, the modest comfort of his life, and the feeling of separation from his English culture and close friends. It was not only through assiduous study but also through prayer and the practice of mortification that Newman had reached moral certainty about religious truths.
Newman’s closing paragraph in the Essay on the Development of Christian Doctrine was an entreaty to readers, but just as much to himself, to act courageously with the light of reason and faith in assent to revealed Truth; it was a description of the heavy state of his soul, suffused with an inner peace, which is the fruit of the Truth.
Such were the thoughts concerning the “Blessed Vision of Peace,” of one whose long-continued petition had been that the Most Merciful would not despise the work of His own Hands, nor leave him to himself;—while yet his eyes were dim, and his breast laden, and he could but employ Reason in the things of Faith. And now, dear Reader, time is short, eternity is long.
Put not from you what you have here found; regard it not as mere matter of present controversy; set not out resolved to refute it, and looking about for the best way of doing so; seduce not yourself with the imagination that it comes of disappointment, or disgust, or restlessness, or wounded feeling, or undue sensibility, or other weakness. Wrap not yourself round in the associations of years past, nor determine that to be truth which you wish to be so, nor make an idol of cherished anticipations. Time is short, eternity is long.96
NUNC DIMITTIS SERVUM TUUM DOMINE,
SECUNDUM VERBUM TUUM IN PACE
QUIA VIDERUNT OCULI MEI SALUTARE TUUM.97
________
1LD, Vol. X, Diary entry and footnote (March 28, 1845), 608.
2Apo., 234.
3John Henry Newman, An Essay on the Development of Christian Doctrine, 6th ed., University of Notre Dame Press, Notre Dame, 1989, from the Foreword by Ian Ker, xvii-xxvii.
4LD, Vol. X, JHN to Mrs. William Froude (June 1, 1845), 686-87; 686.
5LD, Vol. X, JHN to Mrs. William Froude (June 10, 1845), 695-97; 696.
6LD, Vol. X, John Dobree Dalgairns to JHN (June 24, 1845), 713.
7Tracts N. 28, The Via Media, Vol. 1, 40.
8Apo., 111.
9John Henry Newman, An Essay on the Development of Christian Doctrine, 6th ed, University of Notre Dame Press, Notre Dame, 1989, from the Foreword by Ian Ker, xix.
10LD, Vol. X, JHN to Edward Bouverie Pusey (March 14, 1845), 591-94; 593.
11LD, Vol. X, JHN to Charles Crawley (July 14, 1845), 750.
12John Henry Newman, An Essay on the Development of Christian Doctrine, 6th ed., University of Notre Dame Press, Notre Dame, 1989, 40. After this it will be cited Dev.
13Dev., 39.
14Dev., 30.
15Dev., 206.
16Dev., 208, 246.
17Dev., 211.
18Dev., 223.
19Dev., 247.
20Dev., 253.
21Dev., 251.
22Dev., 279.
23Dev., 307.
24Dev., 322.
25Dev., 326.
26Apo., 198.
27Dev., 353.
28Dev., 354.
29LD, Vol. X, JHN to Edward Bouverie Pusey (March 14, 1845), 591-94; 593.
30LD, Vol. X, JHN to Miss Maria Rosina Giberne (June 1, 1845), 682-84.
31Ibid., 683.
32John Henry Newman, Loss and Gain, 327, available at: http://www.newmanreader.org/works/gain/index.html After this it will be cited LG.
33Mary H. Allies, Thomas William Allies, London 1907, 46-47.
34John Henry Newman, Mary, The Virgin Mary in the Life and Writings of John Henry Newman, ed. Philip Boyce, Grand Rapids 2001, 27-32.
35Dev., 416-18.
36Dev., 425-36.
37Apo., 196-97.
38LD, Vol. X, Charles Robert Newman to JHN (May 7, 1845), 647.
39LD, Vol. X, Francis William Newman to JHN(May 1, 1845), 644.
40LD, Vol. X, JHN to Albany James Christie (April 8, 1845), 619.
41LD, Vol. X, JHN to Simeon Lloyd Pope (March 20, 1845), 603-04; 604.
42Ibid., 604.
43LD, Vol. X, JHN to Derwent Coleridge (January 8, 1845), 486.
44LD, Vol. X, Henry William Weltch to JHN (March 17, 1845), 599.
45LD, Vol. X, JHN to Octavius Ogle (April 22, 1845), 624.
46LD, Vol. X, JHN to Edward Bouverie Pusey (July 22, 1845), 736-37; 737.
47LD, Vol. X, JHN to Elizabeth Bowden (June 25, 1845), 713-14; 714.
48The Gladstone Diaries, III, 1840-1847, ed. M.R.D. Foot and H.C.G. Matthew, Oxford, 1974, 461.
49LD, Vol. X, JHN to John Dobree Dalgairns (June 29, 1845), 720-21; 720.
50Ibid., 720.
51LD, Vol. X, JHN to Elizabeth Bowden (June 25, 1845), 713-14; 714.
52LD, Vol. X, JHN to John Dobree Dalgairns (June 29, 1845), 720-21; 721.
53LD, Vol. X, JHN to Tresham Dames Gregg (July 17, 1845), 733.
54LD, Vol. X, William Brudenell Barter to JHN (June 2, 1845), 688.
55LD, Vol. X, Henry Anthony Jeffreys to JHN (June 5, 1845), 692.
56LD, Vol. X, JHN to H. A. Jeffreys (June 8, 1845), 695.
57LD, Vol. X, H. A. Jeffreys to JHN (June 9, 1845), 695; JHN to H. A. Jeffreys (June 12, 1845), 703-04.
58LD, Vol. X, JHN to Richard Westamacott (July 11, 1845), 729-30.
59LD, Vol. X, Richard Westamacott to JHN (July 16, 1845), 732.
60LD, Vol. X, JHN to Mrs. John Mozley (August 6, 1845), 743-44.
61LD, Vol. X, JHN to Mrs. John Mozley (August 17, 1845), 748-49; 748.
62Ibid., 748.
63Ibid., 749.
64Trevor, Newman, The Pillar of the Cloud, 351.
65LD, Vol. X, JHN to Miss Maria Rosina Giberne (August 24, 1845), 751-52; 752.
66LD, Vol. X, Francis William Newman to JHN (August 6, 1845), 744-45.
67LD, Vol. X, JHN to Francis William Newman (August 7, 1845), 745.
68Ibid.
69LD, Vol. X, Francis William Newman to JHN (August 6, 1845), 744-45, 745.
70LD, Vol. X, JHN to Nicholas Wiseman (April 16, 1845), 626-27.
71Wilfrid Ward, The Life and Times of Cardinal Wiseman, Vol. I, Longmans, Green, and Co., London, 1897, 424.
72Ibid., 428.
73LD, Vol. X, Diary entry (August 16, 1845), 747.
74This seventh-century pope advocated Monothelism, the doctrine that Christ has only one will, the divine will, a heresy, which was condemned after his death by the Third Council of Constantinople.
75LD, Vol. X, JHN to An unknown Correspondent (August 1845), 750.
76LD, Vol. X, Diary entry (August 25, 1845), 752.
77LD, Vol. X, JHN to Revd. Mr. Randal Lythgoe, S.J. (August 25, 1845), 752.
78LD, Vol. X, Mrs. William George Ward to JHN (September 5, 1845), 757.
79LD, Vol. X, JHN to Simeon Lloyd Pope (September 18, 1845), 762-63; 763.
80After making a profession of faith, candidates to be received into the Roman Catholic Church recite some sentences in which they reject all the errors condemned by the Church and profess obedience to the local bishop and Roman Pontiff.
81LD, Vol. X, Confirmations at Oscote [sic] The Recent Conversions (September 20, 1845). From the Tablet Evening Edition, 763.
82Denis Gwynn, Father Dominic Barbieri, Desmond & Stapleton, Buffalo, 1948, 199-200.
83LD, Vol. X, JHN to Robert Francis Wilson (September 25, 1845), 766.
84LD, Vol. X, Richard Stanton to JHN (October 2, 1845), 770-771.
85LD, Vol. X, Mrs. Elizabeth Bowden to John Henry Bowden (October 7, 1845), 772.
86Ibid.
87LD, Vol. X, John Keble to John Henry Newman (October 3, 1845), 774-75.
88Trevor, Newman, The Pillar of the Cloud, 358-60.
89Gwynn, Father Dominic Barbieri, 204.
90LG, 384.
91Gwynn, Father Dominic Barbieri, 207.
92Ibid., 205.
93Ibid., 211.
94LD, Vol. XXIV, JHN to Sir John Coleridge (September 17, 1868), 142-43.
95William Shakespeare, Macbeth, Scene 1, Act 1. The Complete Works of William Shakespeare, The Cambridge Edition Text, ed. William Aldis Wright, (Philadelphia: The Blakiston Co., 1944), 1027.
96Dev., 445.
97“Lord, now let your servant depart in peace, according to your word; for my eyes have seen your salvation …” Lk. 2:‘29-30, quoted in Dev., 445.