the revealed articles, with a certain and full persuasion of their revealed truth:* or, to use the words of your primate, Wake: “When I give my assent to what God has revealed, I do it, not only with a certain assurance that what I believe is true, but with an absolute security that it cannot be false." Now the Protestant, who has nothing to trust to but his own talents, in interpreting the books of Scripture, especially with all the dif ficulties and uncertainties which he labors under, according to what I have shown above, never can rise to this certain assurance and absolute security, as to what is revealed in Scripture. The utmost he can say is: such and such appears to me at the present moment to be the sense of the texts before me : and if he is candid, he will add; but perhaps, upon further consideration and upon comparing these with other texts, I may alter my opinion. How far short, dear sir, is such mere opinion from the certainty of faith! I may here refer you to your own experience. Are you accustomed, in reading your Bible, to conclude, in your own mind, with respect to those points which appear to you most clear: I believe in these, with a certain assurance of their truth, and an absolute security that they cannot be false; especially when you reflect that other learned, intelligent, and sincere Christians have understood those passages in quite a different sense from what you do? For my part, having sometimes lived and conversed familiarly with Protestants of this description, and noticed their controversial discourses, I never found one of them absolutely fixed in his mind, for any long time together, as to the whole of his belief. I invite you to make the experiment on the most intelligent and religious Protestant of your acquaintance. Ask him a considerable number of questions, on the most important points of his religion: note down his answers, while they are fresh in your memory. Ask him the same questions, but in a different order, a month afterwards; when I can almost venture to say, you will be surprised at the difference you will find, between his former and his latter creed. After all, we need not use any other means to discover the state of doubt and uncertainty, in which many of your greatest divines and most profound scriptural students have passed their days, than to look into their publications. I shall satisfy myself with citing the Pastoral Charge of one of them, a living bishop, to his clergy. Speaking of the Christian doctrines he says: "I think it safer to tell you, where they are contained, than what they are. They are contained in the Bible, and if, in reading that book, your sentiments concerning the dcctrines of Christianity should be different from those of your * On the Creed, p. 15. + Princip. of Christ. Rel. p. 17. neighbor, or from those of the church, be persuaded on your part, that infallibility appertains as little to you as it does to the church."* Can you read this, my dear sir, without shuddering? If a most learned and intelligent bishop and professor of divinity, as Dr. Watson certainly is, after studying all the Scriptures and all the commentators upon them, is forced publicly to confess to his assembled clergy, that he cannot tell them what the doctrines of Christianity are, how unsettled must his mind have been! and of course, how far removed from the assurance of faith! In the next place, how fallacious must that rule of the mere Bible be, which, while he recommends it to them, he plainly signifies, will not lead them to a uniformity of sentiments, one with another, nor even with their church! There can be no doubt, sir, but that those who entertain doubts concerning the truth of their religion, in the course of their lives, must experience the same with redoubled anxiety at the approach of death. Accordingly there are, I believe, few of our Catholic priests in an extensive ministry, who have not been frequently called in to receive dying Protestants into the Catholic Church,† while not a single instance can be produced, of a Catholic wishing to die in any other communion than his own. O Death, thou great enlightener! O truthtelling Death, how powerful art thou in confuting the blasphemies, and dissipating the prejudices of the enemies of God's church! Taking it for granted, that you, dear sir, have not been without your doubts and fears as to the safety of the road in which you are walking to eternity, more particularly in the course of the present controversy, and being anxious beyond expression that you should be free from these, when you arrive at the brink of that vast ocean, I cannot do better than address you in the words of the great St. Augustin, to one in your situation: "If you think you have been sufficiently tossed about, * Bishop Watson's Charge to his Clergy, in 1795. † A large proportion of those grandees who were the most forward in promoting the Reformation, so called, and among the rest Cromwell, Earl of Essex, the King's Ecclesiastical Vicar, when they came to die, returned to the Catholic Church. This was the case also with Luther's chief protector, the Elector of Saxony, the persecuting Queen of Navarre, and many other foreign Protestant princes. Some bishops of the Established Church; for instance, Goodman and Cheyney of Gloucester, and Gordon of Glasgow, probably also King of London, and Halifax of St. Asaph's, died Catholics. A long list of titled or otherwise distinguished personages, who have either re turned to the Catholic faith, or, for the first time embraced it on their deathbeds, in modern times, might be named here, if it were prudent to do so. This is remarked by Sir Toby Mathews, son of the Archbishop of York, Hugh Cressy, Canon of Windsor and Dean of Leighlin, F. Walsingham, and Ant. Ulric, Duke of Brunswick, all illustrious converts; also Beurier in his Conferences, p. 400. and wish to see an end to your anxieties, follow the rule of Catholic discipline, which came down to us through the apostles from Christ himself, and which shall descend from us to the latest posterity." Yes, renounce the fatal and foolish presumption of fancying that you can interpret the Scripture better than the Catholic Church, aided, as she is, by the tradition of all ages, and the Spirit of all truth.† But I mean to treat this latter subject at due length in my next letter. I am, dear sir, &c. JOHN MILNER. DEAR SIR LETTER X.-TO JAMES BROWN, ESQ., &c. THE TRUE RULE. I HAVE received your letter, and also two others from gentlemen of your Society, on what I have written to you concerning the insufficiency of Scripture, interpreted by individuals, to constitute a secure rule of faith. From these it is plain, that my arguments have produced a considerable sensation in the society; insomuch that I find myself obliged to remind them of the terms on which we mutually entered upon this correspondence; namely, that each one should be at perfect liberty to express his sentiments on the important subject under consideration, without complaint or offence of the other. The strength of my arguments is admitted by you all: yet you all bring invincible objections, as you consider them, from Scripture and other sources against them. I think it will render our controversy more simple and clear, if, with your permission, I defer answering these, till after I have said all that I have to say concerning the Catholic rule of faith. The Catholic rule of faith, as I stated before, is not merely the written word of God, but the whole word of God, both written and unwritten; in other words, Scripture and tradition, and these propounded and explained by the Catholic Church. This implies that we have a two-fold rule or law, and that we have an interpreter, or judge, to explain it, and to decide upon it in all doubtful points. I. I enter upon this subject with observing that all written laws * De Utilit. Cred. c. 8. † Bossuet, in his celebrated Conference with Claude, which produced the conversion of Mlle. Duras, obliged him to confess that, by the Protestant rule, "every artisan and husbandman may and ought to believe that he can understand the Scriptures better than all the fathers and doctors of the church, ancient and modern, put together." necessarily suppose the existence of unwritten laws, and indeed depend upon them for their force and authority. Not to run into the depths of ethics and metaphysics on this subject, you know, dear sir, that, in this kingdom, we have common or un written law, and statute or written law, both of them binding; but that the former necessarily precedes the latter. The legis lature, for example, makes a written statute, but we must learn beforehand, from the common law, what constitutes the le gislature, and we must also have learnt from the natural and the Divine laws, that the legislature is to be obeyed in all things which these do not render unlawful. The municipal law of England," says Judge Blackstone, "may be divided into lex non scripta, the unwritten or common law, and the lex scripta, or statute law."* He afterwards calls the common law, "the first ground and chief corner-stone of the laws of England.”† "If," continues he, "the question arises, how these customs or maxims are to be known, and by whom their validity are to be determined? The answer is, by the judges in the several courts of justice. They are the depositories of the laws, the living oracles, who must decide in all cases of doubt, and who are bound by oath to decide according to the law of the land." So absurd is the idea of binding mankind by written laws, without laying an adequate foundation for the authority of those laws, and without constituting living judges to decide upon them! The Neither has the Divine wisdom, in founding the spiritual kingdom of his church, acted in that inconsistent manner. Almighty did not send a book, the New Testament, to Christians, and, without so much as establishing the authority of that book, leave them to interpret it, till the end of time, each one according to his own opinions or prejudices. But our blessed Master and Legislator, Jesus Christ, having first demonstrated his own divine legation from his heavenly Father by undeniable miracles, commissioned his chosen apostles, by word of mouth, to proclaim and explain, by word of mouth, his doctrines and precepts to all nations, promising to be with them in the execution of this office of his heralds and judges, even to the end of the world. This implies the power he had given them, of or daining successors in this office, as they themselves were only to live the ordinary term of human life. True it is, that, during the execution of their commission, he inspired some of them, and of their disciples, to write certain parts of these doctrines and precepts, namely, the canonical gospels and epistles, which they addressed, for the most part, to particular persons and on * Comment. on the Laws, Introduct. sect. iii. + Ibid. sect. iii. p. 73, 8th edit. + Ibid. n. 69. particular occasions; but these inspired writings, by no means, rendered void Christ's commission to the apostles and their successors, of preaching and explaining his word to the nations, or his promise of being "with them" till the end of time. On the contrary, the inspiration of these very writings is not otherwise known than by the viva voce evidence of these depositories and judges of the revealed truths.-This analysis of revealed religion, so conformable to reason and the civil constitution of our country, is proved to be true, by the written word itself-by the tradition and conduct of the apostles-and by the constant testimony and practice of the fathers and doctors of the church in all ages. II. Nothing then, dear sir, is further from the doctrine and practice of the Catholic Church than to slight the Holy Scriptures. So far from this, she had religiously preserved and perpetuated them, from age to age, during almost 1500 years before Protestants existed. She has consulted them, and confirmed her decrees from them in her several councils. She enjoins her pastors, whose business it is to instruct the faithful, to read and study them without intermission, knowing that "All Scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness." 2 Tim. iii. 16. Finally, she proves her perpetual right to announce and explain the truths and precepts of her divine Founder, by several of the strongest and clearest passages contained in Holy Writ.* Such, for the example, is the last commission of Christ, alluded to above: "Go ye therefore and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost; teaching them to observe all the things whatsoever I have commanded you. And lo! I am with you all days, even to the end of the world." Matt. xxviii. 19, 20. And again, "Go ye into all the world, and preach the Gospel to every creature." Mark, xvi. 15. It is preaching and teaching then, that is to say, the unwritten word, which Christ has appointed to be the general method of propagating his divine truths: and, whereas he promises to be with his apostles to the end of the world; this proves their authority in expounding, and shows that the same authority was to descend to their legitimate successors in the sacred ministry, since they themselves were only to live the ordinary term of human life. In like manner the following clear texts prove the authority of the apostles and their successors, for ever; that is to say, the authority of the ever-living and speaking tribunal of the church, * St. Austin uses this argument against the Donatists: "In Scripturis discimus Christum, in scripturis discimus Ecclesiam. Si Christum teneatis, quare Ecclesiam non tenetis ?" |