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THE

CHURCHMAN'S MONTHLY REVIEW

AND CHRONICLE.

FEBRUARY, 1844.

ANCIENT CHRISTIANITY: Supplement. 8vo. pp. 142. London: Jackson & Walford. 1844.

Nor does the author

THIS supplementary number of one of the most important works of modern times, has rather disappointed us. himself conceal a similar feeling. He says,

"The long delay that has occurred in the appearance of this supplementary and concluding number of his work, the author has much regretted, and would gladly have prevented. He owes an apology to his friendly readers, on this behalf; and yet can only advance the frequent plea of want of leisure. Copious materials for sustaining the principal points of his argument, and which, at one time, he had hoped to bring forward, he has, from the same cause, abandoned; and thus has left many points, animadverted upon by his critics, unexplained, which might, he thinks, have been cleared up."-(Advertisement, p. 1.)

The tract is, in fact, not so much an integral portion of the Ancient Christianity, as a collection of detached thoughts upon other, though kindred, subjects.

Yet some of these brief essays, or discussions, are exceedingly important.

The first is on a topic which has often disquieted and disturbed the minds of sincere Churchmen; we mean, the deference to "Antiquity" which marks the Book of Homilies. Mr. Taylor establishes, we must admit, the fact, that this is a weak and indefensible point, in the conduct of our Reformers; and that there is nothing left for us but frankly to confess the fault, and to further, as far as we may, any proposal for its amendment.

The real state of the case is thus lucidly explained :

Every reader of the Homilies must have remarked in them a frequent want of precision, and of verbal accuracy in the quotation of scripture; so that even after a large allowance has been made on account of the unfixed state of the English versions at that time, it will still be unavoidable to admit that the writers gave themselves too little pains in collating, with the original, or with versions, those passages of the Bible which, at the moment, they had occasion to adduce.

"This incidental circumstance will prepare us to expect a still greater vagueness, and more frequent inaccuracies, when the old doctors and ancient fathers' are to be quoted. The fathers had perhaps been perused with some diligence, in early life; and thus a recollection of certain signal passages would naturally remain upon the memory; and from such stores, and while the books or manuscripts were no longer within their reach, the Homilists drew the illustrations, or the supposed corroborations which their argument needed; and especially, any that might seem adapted to the urgent purpose of repelling the charge of novelty and innovation, so constantly brought against the Novators,' by their opponents.

"There is moreover another supposition, probable in itself, and which, as we shall see, the facts seem to suggest-namely-That the writers of the Homilies, having at some early period of their studies, filled their commonplace books with pithy insulated sentences, and with passages of the kind that seemed to bear favourably upon the great controversy of the times, they, as occasion required, turned to this Thesaurus, and thence copied out whatever might serve the immediate purpose of their argument; and this without seeking to know, or even suspecting, what might occur in the very same page of the book quoted;-much less what was the general purport and theological character of the author's writings, whom they thus incautiously referred to.

66

Some supposition of this kind we shall find to be absolutely indispensable for enabling us to explain, in any manner, several of those astounding solecisms which meet us in these venerable compositions. Let it be imagined that the writer, under a certain head in his book of common places, had inserted some just and striking sentences from Augustine, or Chrysostomnot noting at the time of making this extract what might be the drift of the treatise, or even of the very paragraph;-much less considering the general tendency of the same Father's theology. The citation-adduced to sustain a protestant argument, is not perhaps verbally false-it may even be literally exact; nevertheless, if considered in its connection, it must be rejected as argumentatively inconclusive, or logically fallacious. We may be sure that if the writer had taken the trouble to look to the connection, he would have shuddered at the thought of availing himself of so unsound a support!

"The Reformers, incessantly reproached as they were by their adversaries, as innovators--broachers of novelties, and preachers of a religion not older than themselves, or than John Huss and Wickliffe, were naturally forward to snatch at any seeming support which their doctrine might derive from those writers to whom Romanists themselves appealed as ultimate authorities. Such support on some few points, and to a very limited extent, they might legitimately receive; nor is it strange if, in the eagerness and hurry of so strenuous and perilous a conflict, they frequently adduced passages, at a first glance corroborative of their principles, but which, if interpreted by the analogy of the system of doctrine and discipline whereof they were a part, would very poorly, or not at all, have borne out the meaning assigned to them; or have told in the opposite direction."—(pp. 2—4.)

The hypothesis which he thus broaches, Mr. Taylor makes good with his usual industry and success. He begins with a passage

in the second part of the Homily "of Salvation;" in which Hilary, Basil, and Ambrose are cited. He shows various positive errors in the references; but chiefly he dwells upon this point, that these writers are unfairly adduced as maintaining the doctrine of justification by faith,-the fact, the undeniable and notorious fact being, that they all of them had very obscure notions on this subject, and were fast lapsing into the errors of "the expiatory efficacy of penances and good works."

He next refers to a citation given in the Homily "" on Good Works," as "to this purpose writeth St. John Chrysostom." Whereas the piece from whence the quotation is taken is notoriously spurious. In another place, in the Homily " on Peril of Idolatry," to raise the authority of Epiphanius, who tore down a painting from a church-wall, the Homily proceeds: -" In the Tripartite Ecclesiastical History, the ninth book, and forty-eighth chapter, is testified that Epiphanius, being yet alive, did work miracles, and that after his death, devils being expelled at his grave or tomb, did roar."-(pp. 14, 15.)

On which Mr. Taylor remarks:

"Now this is precisely an instance of that kind of incongruous citation of ancient authorities which, unless it be largely allowed for, and set off from our deference to the formularies of the Church, must render them doctrinally unintelligible and contradictory. Do the Homilists intend us to accept and assent to the miracles to which they thus refer? Certainly not, for they pointedly condemn the entire system of relic-worship, and the invocation of saints, which were therewith connected.

"The Homilist quotes the Tripartite history-that is to say, the version of Socrates, Sozomen, and Theodoret, made under the eye of Cassiodorus in the sixth century. But it would have been better to trace this testimony to its source, namely, the Ecclesiastical History of Sozomen, b. vii. chap. 27; for assuredly the compiler of the Tripartite History could know nothing more of the facts than what his author, Sozomen, has related; but neither does this writer, nor even his reporter, affirm what the Homilist attributes to him. Sozomen, speaking of Epiphanius, says-Mortuo enim illo id quod viventi non contigerat, ad sepulchrum ejus dæmones etiamnum fugari, et morbi quidam curari dicuntur. The-'did roar,' is therefore an embellishment, appended by, we know not whom, to the original story. Cassiodorus, or his friend, the translator of the ecclesiastical histories, renders exactly the words of Sozomen. In that place of the Tripartite history to which we are so carefully referred by the Homilist, we find as follows;-Eo quoque tempore fuit Epiphanius, Cypriorum Episcopus, ad cujus sepulchrum hactenus Sczomen (doeri vûv) dæmones expelluntur. Nicephorus, b. xii. c. 46, in repeating this passage, expands it a little; but even he does not give us the-' did roar,' of the Homily."-(p. 15.)

Again, in the same Homily, Augustine is thus cited

"The same Augustine teacheth in the twelfth book of the City of God, the tenth chapter, that neither temples nor churches ought to be builded or made for martyrs or saints, but to God alone; and that there ought no priests to be appointed for martyr or saint, but to God only." The same St. Augustine, in his book of the manners of the Catholic church, hath these words;

"I know that many be worshippers of tombs and pictures; I know that there be many that banquet most riotously over the graves of the dead, and giving meat to dead carcases, do bury themselves upon the buried, and attribute their gluttony and drunkenness to religion." See he esteemeth worshipping of saints' tombs and pictures, as good religion as gluttony and drunkenness, and no better at all. St. Augustine greatly alloweth Marcus Varro, affirming, that religion is most pure without images, and saith himself, "Images be of more force to crooken an unhappy soul, than to teach and instruct it." And saith further, Every child, yea every beast, knoweth that it is not God that they see. Wherefore then doth the Holy Ghost so often admonish us of that which all men know?" Whereunto St. Augustine himself answereth thus: "For," saith he, "when images are placed in temples, and set in honourable sublimity, and begin once to be worshipped, forthwith breedeth the most vile affection of error." This is St. Augustine's judgment of images in churches, that by-and-by they breed error and idolatry.'”—(pp. 22, 23.)

To which Mr. Taylor very fairly objects :

:

"If we take these several quotations from Augustine, just as they stand, and without reference to the places whence they are taken, we must first note the historical facts which they either affirm, or clearly imply these areThat, in his time, there were, what he says there ought not to be-temples and churches dedicated to martyrs and saints-That many called Christians worshipped tombs and pictures-That the festivals of the dead were often celebrated with riot and intemperance-That images in churches were not unknown-that they were actually worshipped there; and that this idolatry had already ripened its natural fruits-producing the most vile affection of

error.'

"But if so-and if the professedly Christian community had fallen into a condition of flagrant idolatry, then we pointedly ask-What becomes of the allegation that these times were the most pure and holy?' Surely such a state of things must have been the consequence of a previous 'falling away!' Augustine remonstrates against these heathen practices. But, had he himself done nothing to promote them? Alas! his many festival orations, as well as other passages in his writings, could have had no other effect than that of confirming the common people in their guilty superstitions! Of what avail was it to caution an ignorant, paganized people, not to worship the saints and martyrs, when they were encouraged to address to them their fervent petitions, and to entreat miraculous aids at their hands?"—(p. 23.)

But we may close our quotations with the following passage. "A little further on, St. Ambrose is cited as a witness against the invocation of saints! But the reference is to the Commentary on the Romans, a work which is rejected as manifestly spurious' by the Benedictine editors. The mind of Ambrose on this subject may, however, easily be learned from various allusions to the customs of the times. In commenting upon one of these instances the editors say-Agnoscant ex hoc loco Novatores (the Reformers) quam sit moris antiqui vota sanctis in cœlum receptis nuncupare, quo eorum suffragiis à Deo fideles expeditius optata consequantur.--A mother exhorting her son, says, Redde martyri, quod debes martyri (St. Lawrence). Ille te nobis impetravit.-Exhort. Virgin. c. iii. In almost every instance in which Protestants and Romanists are at issue, Ambrose may properly be appealed to by the latter; not the former.

"Let us not,' says the protestant homilist, let us not put our trust or confidence in the saints or martyrs that be dead.' But upon the martyrsnamely, SS. Gervasius and Protasius-Ambrose professes his confident reliance, in so many words. No opposition of sentiment can be more extreme than that which distinguishes the English homily from the faith and practice