The Archdeacon replied with characteristic courtesy. He disclaimed any intention of imputing any dishonesty of motive or intention to the writers of the Tracts. He entertained a high respect for their character and attainments. But he sincerely believed that

'the respectable and learned authors of those Tracts were, unawares to themselves, injuring the pure and scriptural doctrines of the Protestant Faith.'

Another critic who added largely to Pusey's correspondence at this time was the Rev. George Townsend, Canon of Durham. Relying upon the accuracy of the Rev. P. Maurice's pamphlet, and an article in the Christian Observer and 'private information,' he had addressed the clergy of the Peculiar of North Allerton and Allertonshire in the Province of York on the subject of new practices-not doctrines -that were growing up among the adherents of the Oxford school. With great labour, and at the cost of an immense expenditure of time, Pusey convinced him that he had been misled by the authorities on which he depended and the exaggerated reports which he had heard. But the Charge served to swell the gathering volume of unintelligent protest; and the Bishops, or at least Bishop Bagot, began to receive those anonymous denunciations of men and opinions which are inevitable in such circumstances. At last Bishop Bagot wrote to Pusey, enclosing at least one composition of the kind, and begging him to explain how matters really stood. Pusey's letter, the substance of which appeared in an expanded form some months afterwards, is interesting historically as well as on personal grounds :

E. B. P. TO THE BISHOP OF OXFORD.

MY DEAR LORD BISHOP,

September 26, 1837.

As they have troubled your lordship with those strange statements of what some of the clergy in Oxford are supposed to have done, it seems due from us to inform your lordship what the real state of the case is.

The reports began with a Mr. Maurice, a chaplain of New College, who seems a very excited and vain and half-bewildered person, who seems to think that he is called by God to oppose what he calls the

Letter to Bishop Bagot.

15

Popery of Oxford. He published a heavy pamphlet, which would have died a natural death had not the Christian Observer wished to have a blow at Mr. Newman and the High Church,' and so taken it up though with a sort of protest against identifying itself with Mr. Maurice's language; and thence, I am sorry to say, Mr. Townsend, Prebendary of Durham, has repeated it in a 'Charge to the Clergy of the Peculiar of N. Allerton and Allertonshire.'

The charges made have been 'needless bowings, unusual attitudes in prayers, the addition of a peculiar kind of cross to the surplice, and the placing the Bread and Wine on a small additional table near the Lord's Table or Altar.' These are, at least, what Mr. Townsend repeats.

With regard to the 'needless bowings,' I cannot imagine the origin of the report: there have been no bowings, except at the Name of our Lord.

The 'unusual attitudes in prayer,' I suppose, refer to the new chapel at Littlemore, where there is, as in old times, an eagle instead of reading-desk, and the minister during the prayers kneels towards the East, the same way as the congregation, turning to the congregation in the parts addressed to them in the way recommended by Bp. Sparrow in his 'Rationale of the Common Prayer,' and which Bp. S. doubts not is implied by our rubric before the Te Deum, which speaks of the minister's 'turning himself as he may best be heard,' which implies, he says, that before, he was turned some other way. And he speaks of this practice as still existing about his time. Mr. Newman does the same in his Morning Daily Service in the chancel of St. Mary's, when he has a congregation in many respects different from that which attends the Sunday Service; but in the Sunday Service he has introduced no change whatever. In the Daily Service, being a new service to a new congregation, he thought himself free to follow what seemed to him the meaning of our rubric, according, as it does, with primitive usage and that of our own Church, sanctioned by Bp. Sparrow (whose comment on the rubric has been reprinted by Bp. Mant in the Christian Knowledge Common Prayer-book) and by the practice in Cathedrals in the Litany and Ordination Services, as your lordship well knows.

The 'additional cross' was, as I mentioned to your lordship, worn by one individual only; but I had not time to explain that this was no device of his own, but according to one interpretation of the rubric prefixed to the Morning Service about the 'Ornaments of the Church and the Minister' being 'the same as in the 2nd year of Edw. VI.' The scarf there directed to be worn had crosses on it. I saw the scarf in question: it was a very narrow one, about three inches I think, with two very unpretending crosses at the two ends, and was meant to be exactly the same as that prescribed in Edward VIth's time, and, as some think, enjoined still. For myself, though the ornaments in

Edward VIth's time were much handsomer than those now in use (especially the Bishop's is very beautiful), yet I am content with that explanation of the rubric which dispenses with our observing it; we have too much to do to keep sound doctrine and the privileges of the Church to be able to afford to go into the question about dresses. Still, as Bp. Cosin and others maintain the opinion that this rubric is binding, I did not think it worth while to advise the young clergyman who wore the one in question against it, further than giving him the general advice not to let his attention be distracted by these things from others of more moment. A rigid adherence to the rubric cannot,

in its own nature, lead to extravagance, and it seemed a very safe way for the exuberance of youth to vent itself in. I have said the more because he was a pupil of my own; he was a very active and energetic man, and likely to make a very good parish priest, but he has now left Oxford. While here he officiated occasionally at St. Thomas', there only, and Mr. Newman did not know him. Two other individuals wore the same scarf, without the crosses, thinking it safer. Mr. Newman and myself were not acquainted with them when they began the practice. It was in Magdalen College Chapel.

With regard to the remaining charge I need not say anything to your lordship. The innovation clearly is with those who allow the Bread and Wine to be placed upon the Altar by clerks or sextons; only I would say that the 'small additional table' has not been unnecessarily introduced. In St. Mary's and St. Aldate's the Elements have been placed in a recess already existing near the Altar; in St. Michael's the old custom has never been disused; in St. Paul's and Littlemore only, there being no other provision, since the Elements must be placed somewhere, a small neat table has been used as being the more decent

way.

I have taken up much of your lordship's time by this long explanation, but I was vexed that your lordship should be troubled by complaints against any friend or acquaintance of mine; it is, in fact, only a side-blow at sound principles, because it is easier to talk about 'dresses' and 'innovations' than to meet arguments.

I have written to Mr. Townsend, stating to him the case and requesting him to correct his misstatements, and, if he does not, purpose to send the letter to the British Magazine, and so I hope that your lordship will not be further troubled in consequence of these exaggerations. In the meantime, if this explanation can be used in any way to prevent any further annoyance, your lordship will of course make any use of it.

Mr. Newman as well as myself much regrets that these idle reports have caused these explanations to be made to your lordship. We would have contradicted them sooner had there seemed any sufficient reason, such as this. I join myself, because these papers always join Mr. Newman and myself, although we maintain no one doctrine or

Letter to Bishop Bagot.

17

practice which has not the sanction of the great divines of our Church.

Begging your lordship to excuse the length of this letter,

I have the honour to remain,

Your lordship's faithful and obedient servant,

These attacks and suspicions were

E. B. PUSEY.

but a foretaste of

what was to come on a larger scale. But as yet nothing had occurred to warrant mistrust of the Movement by any large body of Churchmen, or discouragement on the part of its adherents.

CHAPTER XX.

PROGRESS-S. P. C. K. COMMITTEES-KEBLE'S SERMONSVISIT TO GUERNSEY-FIFTH OF NOVEMBER SERMON -TRACT ON THE HOLY EUCHARIST-MISSIONARY EXHIBITIONS-COLLEGES OF CLERGY FOR LARGE TOWNS-DR. HOOK AND THE TRACTS-HARRISON, CHAPLAIN TO THE ARCHBISHOP OF CANTERBURY.

1837-1838.

THE years that immediately followed the Hampden controversy were not characterized by any striking outward incident, nor by any specially urgent controversy. It was a time seemingly of steady and deepening progress. The slighter tracts had ceased, and had made way for more solid treatises, appealing not so much ad populum, but, as was said, ad scholas and ad clerum. It was a time now not only of writing but of preaching: it was a time to drive home to the heart and conscience principles which had been more or less intellectually accepted. Thus there was emerging, besides Newman's Parochial Sermons, the series of Plain Sermons by contributors to 'Tracts for the Times.' Pusey himself was not only preaching in various places, but pressing on Keble the duty that lay on him also to publish his sermons. He was, on the one hand, feeling after the idea of Colleges of Clergy for work in the large cities; on the other he was either by conversation or correspondence, dealing with individuals who had been powerfully affected by their acceptance of Church principles. He was beginning to exercise a general direction in the difficult