spacious than the so-called Free Churches; it has stood for a larger tradition and diffused a sunnier air. It was Matthew Arnold's distinction to have seen this, and, by his insistence upon it, to have recalled attention from the fact to the idea. To understand Mrs Ward it is well to bear in mind her heredity. Of a later generation, her knowledge in certain fields is greater than that of Dr Arnold; of a naturally graver temperament, her seriousness of purpose is, if not more real, at least more obvious than that of his distinguished son. But she owes much to each, and has carried on the work to which they addressed themselves; the great line, 'Quasi cursores vitai lampada tradunt,' holds of all three.

The inception of Robert Elsmere' was due to a Bampton Lecture given in 1881 by a then prominent High Churchman-the late Bishop John Wordsworth— on the connexion between unbelief and sin. The lives of believers are, unfortunately, sufficient evidence that the lecturer's thesis, as Mrs Ward understood it, was at least not an exhaustive account of the matter. " Iliacos intra muros' peccatur et extra': to live irregularly, it is not necessary to disbelieve. The association of ideas rang false.

'Is this all that a religious teacher at the centre of English intellectual activity, whose business it is to make a study of religious thought and of the religious life in man, can tell us about that great movement of the human mind against the traditional Christian theology, which is to many of us the most important fact of our day and age? Does he see no further, does he understand no more than this?'

The object of the book was to place the question of the divergence between the traditional and the scientific in theology on its true ground. The Pauline distinction between the 'natural' (uxiòs) and the 'spiritual' (πveνμatikòs) man is of importance in this connexion. † There are certain antinomies, God and the World, Good and Evil, Life and Death, etc., which remain unsolved for us, not because they are in themselves insoluble this would be an assumption-but because our minds are so constituted that the understanding cannot come into touch with them; it seems to be +1 Cor. ii, 10-15.

* Robert Elsmere,' introduction, xxvi.

grappling with air. Were the intellectual solution, then, the only one possible, we could not get beyond an admission of ignorance—' I do not know.' The practical, however, comes to the aid of the pure reason—so it is held by an important school of thinkers; we are enabled to meet the difficulty, not indeed by the logical understanding taken separately, but by the knowing faculty (of which it is only a part) as a whole. Here learning has no prerogative. Knowledge of the central truths is not a matter of scholarship, but of the spiritual faculty which St Paul calls faith. But, when religion passes over into theology, and this is made to cover what are called 'dogmatic facts,' it is impossible to withdraw these developments from the province of science or to exempt them from its tests. A Christian poet tells us of truths which 'sages would have died to learn, Now taught by cottage dames.' But these truths cannot include the Synoptic problem, or the history of Christian ideas and institutions. Here we must have recourse to scholarship; and the decision must rest with those who know. In 'Robert Elsmere' Mrs Ward has brought this into clear relief. The task that lies before the enquirer is, she urges, in the last resort, the analysis of testimony-its various values, degrees and kinds. This

"makes almost the chief interest of history. History depends on testimony. What is the nature and the value of testimony at given times? In other words, did the man of the third century understand, or report, or interpret facts in the same way as the man of the sixteenth or the nineteenth? And, if not, what are the differences, and what are the deductions to be made from them, if any?"

"It is enormously important, I grant-enormously."

""I should think it is," said Langham to himself, as he rose; "the whole of orthodox Christianity is in it, for instance." ('Robert Elsmere,' i, 358.)

9

A generation has passed. It is not now argued, at least by Bampton Lecturers, that Liberal theology connotes vice and Conservative theology virtue; nor is it denied that criticism has revised what were formerly looked upon as 'dogmatic facts,' and changed the perspective in which they present themselves to us. Robert Elsmere' has counted in this result; Mrs Ward's service to religion -and it was one of the first importance-was to have

estimated rightly the moral values at issue. Whether this or that event took place or not is a matter not of moral but of historical interest; but, when belief in a doubtful or unhistorical event is imposed upon the conscience, the question becomes moral.

'God is not wisely trusted when declared unintelligible. Such honour rooted in dishonour stands; such faith unfaithful makes us falsely true.

'God is for ever reason; and His communication, His Revelation, is reason.' (Ib. ii. 65.)

We may not, the Greek philosopher reminds us, predicate what is shameful of the Deity; and 'Doth God' (asks the prophet) 'need your lie?' These axioms give us the space and freedom needed for movement. We could not do with less; we need not ask for more.

The practical conclusion of the book is more open to question. In 'Richard Meynell' another solution is proposed for our own time; but it is simply not the case that scholarly Churchmen of the eighties either had to, or did, 'depart and go into exile.' The date of the Book of Daniel is too slender a foundation to bear such a superstructure; nor can it be admitted for a moment that 'a congregation has both a moral and a legal right to demand an implicit belief'† from its minister in a particular interpretation of a particular Scripture narrative. In the Church of England no such right is vested either in a particular congregation, or in a diocesan conference, or in Convocation, even if the House of Laymen be thrown in. The legal right is for the lawthat is, the King in Council; the moral for the conscience of the community at large, not that of any section of it, clerical, lay, or mixed, to decide.

Nor can we think, with Mrs Ward, that Liberal theology occupies a stronger position in the Church now than when Robert Elsmere' was written. A comparison, from this point of view, between the Churchmanship of to-day and that of the eighties does not work out wholly to the advantage of that of to-day. The temper of the Victorian Church was, not indeed absolutely, but relatively larger than that of our own time. Tait and Thirlwall were the most prominent bishops of their tii, 47, 107.

* I, xxvi.

generation; the influence of such scholars as Jowett and Stanley was widely felt. Among the laity there were fewer who made a hobby of ecclesiasticism, but there were also fewer who were indifferent; religion was stronger both as a personal conviction and as a social. convention than now. The particular questions before our generation were, as yet, below the horizon; they had not reached the general mind. But the sectarian standpoint, now taken for granted, was exceptional. The Bible meant more than the Church, and reason more than authority, though the one was unscientifically interpreted and the other inadequately conceived. Enlargement of view has been accompanied by narrowing of spirit.

To those who regard the Church as National first and Anglican second, the outlook to-day is not without features which inspire misgiving. The constitution of the English Church is, fortunately, such that it is impossible for her to commit herself by a binding decision in any subject matter. That great safeguard of liberty and religion, the Royal Supremacy, preserves her from this danger; it ties the hands of her clergy, if it does not bridle their tongues. But the forces which produced the Oxford Movement, however negligible in the world of thought, have not ceased to be strong on their own ground-in the Church, and in public affairs where they touch the Church. Here they have never been so powerful as now. The great weight of lay opinion, inside as well as outside the Church, is against them. But this opinion is inarticulate. The minority is clamorous and insistent; and the official machinery is in its hands. It is natural, therefore, human nature being what it is, that it should have the ear of the episcopate-on whose 'more than Gamaliel-like caution' the latest historian of the English Church comments *-and of ministries, more particularly of ministries which rest on an equilibrium of interests. Such a ministry is unwilling to alienate possible support or to provoke avoidable friction. In secondary matters it follows the line of least resistance; 'the violent bear it away.'

་

* F. Warre-Cornish, The English Church in the Nineteenth Century, ii, 117.

The Nonconformists are opposed on principle to Establishment. For them the Church is a denomination; and they are prepared to deal with it on the basis of Voluntarism. Meanwhile they and theirs throw sops to Cerberus; Liberal politicians have played of late years even more than their opponents into the hands of the High Anglican school. They see, for they are shrewd observers, that this means Disestablishment in the near future. What they do not seem to see is the blow that Disestablishment, brought about in this way, would be to Protestantism and rational religion at home and abroad. Hoc Ithacus velit.' The residuary legatee of the English Church is Catholicism, and, in the long run, the logical and inevitable embodiment of Catholicismthe Church of Rome. Were the nation moving in this direction, time and the growth of knowledge would be the only remedies. The paradox of the present position is that a marked revival of Protestantism in religion and thought should synchronise with the acute medievalising of what is historically the foremost of the Protestant Churches. The most disquieting features of the process are, probably, the deliberate attempt to establish a separate spiritual jurisdiction, and the disposition in certain quarters to bring personal and private pressure to bear upon the solution of questions which the law has not decided, and which it is thought undesirable that the law should be called upon to decide. The remedy lies with those whose civil and religious rights are threatened. The courts are open, and there are deputies; let them implead.'

Helbeck of Bannisdale,' perhaps Mrs Ward's finest book, and Eleanor' describe Catholicism in England and in Italy respectively. The record of the old English Catholics as a body is an honourable one. In the sixteenth century they were made, as the French Catholics have been in the twentieth, the scapegoat of Christendom; their interests were sacrificed to the intrigues of party and to the policy of Rome. The loss was not material only. It was hard, as in the case taken by Mrs Ward, to see the acres diminish and the family fortunes decline. It was harder still to feel the impoverished blood, the decaying energy, the position won in the past slipping away.