Memoirs of James Robert Hope-Scott Part 3

Perhaps you will like to know what effect your article has produced on me.

Simply this: it has convinced me that you are clearing your position of some popular protections which still surrounded it. Beyond this I do not see. I mean it does not show me that, esoterically, you have made any great move, nor yet that, to the world at large, you are disposed to do more than say, 'Do not cry me up as a champion against Popery; for the rest, you may judge of me as you please.' People whom I have heard speak of it (few, perhaps, but fair samples) are rather puzzled than anything else.

I give you this merely as gossip, and not as asking whether my construction is right, though if you think it material or useful to tell me, of course I shall be glad.

I need not say that I shall be very thankful for a copy of your sermons-- that is, if you will write my name in it yourself; otherwise I will buy the book, for Rivington's 'from the author' does not fix the stamp which I chiefly value.

Do you observe in the papers that Sir R. P. is designing _great_ things for the Church? It gives me some hopes that they will also be _good_, to see that Gladstone is in his councils. We shall have much ado about the Eccl. Courts Bill, which, I believe, is certainly to come on.

I am in some hopes we may make it an instrument for drawing a line between us and the Dissenters, but must not be sanguine.

Believe me, dear Newman, ever yrs truly,

JAMES R. HOPE.

Rev. J. H. Newman.

Mr. Newman wrote in explanation as follows:--

_The Rev. J. H. Newman to J. R. Hope, Esq._

Littlemore: February 3, 1843.

My dear Hope,--It is amusing in me to talk of being tired of giving explanations, when I have neither given nor mean to give any; but so it is, whether my hand aches, or I am sick of the subject, I feel as if I have given a hundred. Since you ask me, I will say, as far as I can collect my thoughts on an instant, that my reason for writing and publishing that notice was (but first I will observe that I do not wish it talked about, though it is not worth while going into the reasons why I did it in the way I have. I did it thus after a good deal of thought and fidget, and not seeing any better way, _i.e._ clearer of objections)--but my reason for the _thing_ was my long-continued feeling of the great inconsistency I was in of letting things stand in print against me which I did not hold, and which I could not but be contradicting by my acting every day of my life. And more especially (_i.e._ it came home to me most vividly in that particular way) I felt that I was _taking people_ in; that they thought me what I was not, and were trusting me when they should not, and this has been at times a very painful feeling indeed. I don't want to be trusted (perhaps you may think my fear, even before this affair, somewhat amusing); but so it was and is; people _won't_ believe I go as far as I do--they will cling to their hopes. And then, again, intimate friends have almost reproached me with 'paltering with them in a double sense, keeping the word of promise to their ear, to break it to their hope.' They have said that my words against Rome often, when narrowly examined, were only what _I_ meant, but that the effect of them was what _others_ meant. I am not aware that I have any great motive for this paper beyond this--setting myself right, and wishing to be seen in my proper colours, and not unwilling to do such penance for wrong words as lies in the necessary criticism which such a retractation will involve on the part of friends and enemies; though, since nothing one does is without a meaning [that is, higher than one's own], things may come from it beyond my own meaning.

Thanks for ... the information from newspapers, which you give me, of our hopes from Sir R. P., which I had not seen in them.

By-the-bye, in the paper, for 'person's respect' near the end, read 'persons I respect;' and 'to the editor' is fudge.

Ever yours,

J. H. NEWMAN.

P.S.--Thanks for your flattering answers about my book. It must go, however, from Rivington's with 'from the author,' and I will add my own writing when we meet. Since you have had a specimen of the book (dose?), I may add, in opposition to you, that it will be the best, not the most perfect, book I have done. I mean there is more to develop in it, though it is _im_perfect. [Footnote: A week later (February 10, 1843) he writes to Mr. Hope: 'My University Sermons are the least theological book I have published.']

The famous case of Macmullen _versus_ Hampden was disturbing the University for most of the latter half of the same year 1843. I can only give a mere chronological outline of it, which may a.s.sist such readers as wish to pursue the subject in consulting other sources of information. The Regius Professor of Divinity, Dr. Hampden, had refused to act as Moderator in the Schools, to enable the Rev. E. G. Macmullen, Fellow of Corpus Christi College, to make his exercises for the degree of B.D. [Mr.

Macmullen, it should be remarked, was a strong opponent of the project at that time before the University, mentioned a few pages back, to reverse the condemnation which had been pa.s.sed on Dr. Hampden when he was first appointed Regius Professor of Divinity.] Mr. Macmullen, on this refusal, brought an action into the Vice-Chancellor's Court on May 26, 1843, where, on June 2, Dr. Kenyon of All Souls' presiding, Mr. Hope appeared for Mr.

Macmullen, Dr. Twiss on the other side. Dr. Kenyon p.r.o.nounced in his favour on certain amended articles. Dr. Twiss appealed to the Delegates of Congregation (none of them lawyers), who heard the appeal on November 29, sitting from ten in the morning till seven at night. Mr. Erle and Dr. Twiss both spoke against the articles, and were replied to by Mr. Hope. The Court ultimately gave judgment against the articles, reversing Dr. Kenyon's decision, and gave costs against Mr. Macmullen. [Footnote: For this outline of the proceedings in Macmullen _v_. Hampden, I am indebted to accurate memoranda kindly furnished me by Mr. David Lewis, late Fellow of Jesus College, Oxford.] Mr. Badeley's bitter comment will amuse the reader: 'Mischievous idiots! and so all the conclusive arguments you put before them, are set at nought, and the battle is to be fought again!' [Footnote: Mr. Badeley to Mr. Hope, January 6, 1844] However, there was no further litigation, and in the end Mr. Macmullen succeeded in obtaining his degree, the old form of disputations for that purpose being restored, which has ever since been in force. It should be added that Mr. Hope's services in this case, undertaken amidst all the pressure of his ordinary legal work, were gratuitous.

In the summer of 1843 took place another critical moment of the strife in Dr. Pusey's suspension from preaching, by sentence of the Vice-Chancellor's Court, for his sermon 'On the Holy Eucharist a Comfort to the Penitent.' In the question of his appeal against this, which was matter of anxiety for more than a twelvemonth, it is almost needless to say that he sought the advice of Mr. Hope. The Everett affair, on Commemoration Day (June 28), will have its place in every chronicle of the movement. This was a protest on the part of members of the Tractarian party against an honorary degree conferred in the teeth of a demand for scrutiny (which, however, it was a.s.serted had not been heard in the din), on the American Envoy, Mr.

Everett, who was a Unitarian. Mr. Hope, however, was not present; and I mention this only as one of the many signs of the times which were then rapidly acc.u.mulating. Nor did he take any part in the opposition made in the following year to Dr. Symonds' election as Vice-Chancellor, though he was consulted, in the law of the case, with Mr. Badeley and Dr. Bayford. It ended in a crushing defeat of the Tractarians, who were beaten by a majority of 882 against 183.

In September 1843 Mr. Newman resigned the vicarage of St. Mary's. On this step Mr. Hope, writing to him on September 28, says that he had not differed from him about it, but, 'as to the general tendency of which you described the increase [Mr. Newman's expression (September 5) was: 'The movement is going on so fast that some of the wheels are catching fire'], all I can do is to sit still and wait the issue.'

The 'Lives of the English Saints' were at this time in preparation, the importance of which in the history of the movement is too well known from Cardinal Newman's 'Apologia' and from other sources to require me to enlarge upon it. At length there was no disguise or reservation, but sympathy was openly avowed by members of the Anglican Church for the whole spirit hitherto a.s.sociated with the idea of 'the corruptions of Popery'--as monasticism, the continued exercise of miraculous power in the Church, finally, the supremacy of the Holy See. From a copious correspondence which followed between the two friends, I extract, as usual, such portions as will throw most light on the progressive change in Mr. Hope's religious convictions. His sense of prudence, and the bias derived from his particular legal studies, restrain, rather curiously, the inclination which his feelings in other directions show; but it is best to let him speak for himself:--_The Rev. J. H. Newman to J. R. Hope, Esq_.

Littlemore: Nov. 2, '43.

My dear Hope,--[After stating the perplexity he felt on the question of stopping the 'Lives,' which appeared to present itself in consequence of an objection expressed by Dr. Pusey, in conversation with Mr. Hope, against the Roman tone which had been manifested, Mr. Newman continues:] I did not explain to you sufficiently the state of mind of those who are in danger. I only spoke of those who are convinced that our Church was external to the Church Catholic, though they felt it unsafe to trust their own private convictions. And you seemed to put the dilemma, 'Either men are in doubt or not: if in doubt, they ought to be quiet; if not in doubt, how is it that they stay with us?' But there are two other states of mind which might be mentioned. 1. Those who are unconsciously near Rome, and whose _despair_ about our Church, if anyhow caused, would at once develop into a state of conscious approximation and _quasi_-resolution to go over. 2. Those who feel they can with a safe conscience remain with us, _while_ they are allowed to testify in behalf of Catholicism, and to promote its interests; _i.e_. as if by such acts they were putting our Church, or at least a portion of it, in which they are included, in the position of catechumens. They think they may stay, while they are moving themselves, others, nay, say the whole Church, towards Rome. Is not this an intelligible ground? I should like your opinion of it....

Ever yours sincerely,

JOHN H. NEWMAN.

_J. R. Hope, Esq. to the Rev. J. H. Newman_.

6 Stone Buildings, Linc. Inn: Nov. 4, '43.

Dear Newman,--... As to the Roman leaning, no doubt your 'Lives,' at least many of them, must evince it; no doubt also that, unless carefully managed, it will give offence. But may not caution obviate the latter? Is it not possible to _commence_ by lives which will not at once bring the whole set into popular disrepute? the less palatable ones being kept for a more advanced stage. May it not also be provided that in an historical work, a purely historical character shall be given to what as matter of fact cannot be denied, and which can only be objected to when it is adopted by the writers as a matter of principle in which they themselves concur? To the asceticism, devotion, and anti-secular spirit of the English saints we are, under every point of view, ent.i.tled to refer; and if any part of these virtues was displayed in necessary relation to Rome, or to Roman inst.i.tutions, this in a portraiture of their lives cannot be omitted, but certainly need not be canonised as amongst their merits. It seems to me possible simply to take the Church of their times as _the_ Church, without entering into the question whether any of the conditions under which it then existed are necessary for its existence now. And so their acts done in relation to the Church of their day may be dwelt upon, while the further question whether the Church of our day is capable of eliciting such acts may be left to the judgment of the reader.

I am not sure that I have made myself intelligible in this, and still less whether it is worth your reading, but I fancied that you wished an opinion, and I give it, _valeat quantum_....

Yrs ever truly,

JAMES R. HOPE.

Rev. J. H. Newman.

_The Rev. J. H. Newman to J. R. Hope, Esq._

Littlemore: Nov. 6, 1843.

My dear Hope,-- ... You have not gone to the bottom of the difficulty. It is very easy to say, Give facts without comment; but in the first place, what can be so dry as mere facts? the book won't sell, nor deserve to sell.

It must be ethical; but to be ethical is merely to colour a narrative with one's own mind, and to give a _tone_ to it. Now this is the difficulty, altering this or that pa.s.sage, leaving out this or that expression, will not alter the case. I will not answer for being aware of the tone in myself. Pusey put his finger on pa.s.sages which I had not thought about. Is he to be ever marking pa.s.sages? if so, he has the real trouble of being editor, not I.

_Naturam expellas furca_, &c. Is the Pope's supremacy the only point on which no opinion is to be expressed? if so, why? It is not more against the Articles to _desire_ it than to desire monachism. Will it offend more than others? I will not limit certainly the degree of disgust which some people will feel towards it, but do they feel less towards the notion of monks, or, again, of miracles? Now Church history is made up of these three elements--miracles, monkery, Popery. If any sympathetic feeling is expressed on behalf of the persons and events of Church history, it is a feeling in favour of miracles, or monkery, or Popery, one or all. It is quite a theory to talk of being ethical, yet not concur in these elements of the narrative--unless, indeed, one adopts Milner's or Neander's device of dropping part of the history, praising what one has a fancy for, and thus putting a theory and dream in the place of facts. But it is bad enough to be eclectic in _doctrine._

Next it must be recollected how very much depends on the disposition, relative prominence, &c., of facts; it is quite impossible that a leaning to Rome, a strong offensive leaning, should be hidden.

And then still more it must be recollected that a _vast_ number of questions, and most important ones, are decided this way or that on antecedent probabilities, according to a person's views, _e.g._ the question between St. Augustine and the British Bishops--of Easter--of King Lucius, &c. &c. Opinion comes in at every step of the history.

From what I have said you will see that I consider it impossible to choose _easy_ 'Lives' for the first of the series; there are none such, or if there be a few, when can I promise to have them ready? I suppose Bede must be pretty easy. Keble has it. I do not expect him to send it to me for several years, with his engagements. Take missions, take Bishops, the Pope comes in everywhere. Go to Aldhelm and his schools; you have most strange miracles. Try to retire into the country, you do but meet with hermits. No; miracles, monkery, Popery, are too much for you, if you have any stomach....

The life P. looked at, St. Stephen's, was taken as having hardly, if at all, any miracle in it. If he thinks it will give offence, doubtless the others will still more.

You see, in saying all this I am not deciding the question whether the work is to be done _at all._ On that point I have had great doubt since P.'s objection. Only to do it without offence is impossible, and the more so because, in parts at least, it is likely to be a very taking work....

And then so many 'Lives' are in progress or preparation, that it is most unlikely the work will be stopped; others will conduct it instead of me who will go further; and though this is a bad reason for doing oneself what one feels a misgiving in doing, it is a good reason when one feels none at all....

If the plan is abandoned, this significant question will be, nay, is already asked--'What, then, cannot the Anglican Church bear the Lives of her Saints?'

Ever yrs,

JOHN H. NEWMAN.

_J.R. Hope, Esq. to the Rev. J.H. Newman._

6 Stone Bdgs, Linc. Inn: Nov. 8, '43.

Dear Newman,--Your last shows me plainly what I had not before understood, that the question of the 'Lives' depends immediately upon that larger one which your previous letter had mooted, and that to solve it one must know more than I do of the conclusions at which you have arrived as to the claims of Rome, and as to the mode, time, and circ.u.mstances in and under which those claims ought to be recognised. I feel therefore very incompetent to offer any further suggestion. When I last wrote I thought the questions separable, and meant that the Roman parts of your histories should be treated dramatically (if I may so say), being represented really and faithfully, but only as the scenery in which the actors stood. Your letter shows me that this cannot be, unless your writers have more self- command, and more disposition to exercise it than men in earnest can be expected to have. I must therefore ask, what is your general view as to Rome? Is union with it immediately _necessary_? or is it only _desirable_--under new circ.u.mstances and at some distant period? If the former, then one would think that the question should be openly and professedly discussed, the arguments given and the authorities stated. If the latter, I should imagine that much remains to be done, in the way of raising the general tone of our Church in matters of faith and practice, before it can be fit to deal with such a question; and though you think monachism, miracles, and Popery inseparably allied, yet I feel convinced that there are many minds prepared to consider the two former which have no disposition to the latter.