Divine judgment, fell out exactly as he had predicted.30 30 In order to make the expressions in this passage clearer, it may be well to observe that Gildas had charged the British clergy with neglecting to preach "the faith to the Saxons or English who dwelt among them." Observe that there were only three things asked from the British ecclesiastics by Augustine-that they should conform to the Roman use in calculating the date of Easter; that they should administer baptism according to the Roman rite, and that they should help to preach to the English. All the other things that they did, Augustine was prepared readily to tolerate, although contrary to Roman customs. From this it would appear that there were no differences of vital importance between the Church of Rome and the British Church, with the exception of the three things specified, and this would imply that the British clergy believed in the mass, invocation of saints, the supreme authority of the Pope, the efficacy of relics, purgatory, the use of prayers for the dead, and every other Popish doctrine. According to this line of argument, therefore, the modern Church of England, since it conforms to the first and third of Augustine's requests, and very possibly to the second also, if identical with the ancient British Church, would also be practically identical with the Roman Church. This I say might be the inference drawn by a person unversed in historical study; and I say this advisedly, for just as legal documents can only be rightly understood by lawyers, medical works by physicians, and philosophical writings by those who have already some knowledge of logic, even so history can only be read aright by the expert historian. I will now produce the key to this somewhat obscure passage, a passage that has led writers of different creeds into endless and fatal errors. In offering it to the reader I cannot insist too strongly upon the truth that it is the only key that will avail for a member of the Church of England. Well, then! Augustine in this speech had no intention of attempting to induce the Protestant British Bishops to submit to Rome. On the contrary, he made a direct offer to embrace their creed and himself become a Protestant, provided they would appoint him their archbishop and make the three mere nominal concessions named in his request, these concessions being asked for only to make his conversion less humiliating. Nothing can be clearer than this solution of the difficulty; for it has been proved over and over again in the earlier part of this volume that the British. Church was identical with our Church, and our Church denies the supreme authority of the Pope, and other distinctly Roman doctrines; therefore Augustine was prepared to "liberally tolerate" the denial of the supreme authority of the Pope and other distinctly Roman doctrines. This is the only way out of the difficulty, and it is a distinct, simple, and secure way out of it. It completely disarms all our opponents, whether Agnostics, Methodists, Romanists, or wrong-headed members of our own Church. It is, moreover, a glorious vindication of the identity of the English and British Churches, as well as of the noble birth of our beloved Establishment in the second century of the Christian era. And thus, in the end, truth always triumphs! Fortunately for the credit of the Church of England, our bishops indignantly refused to buy Augustine's conversion with the price of an archbishopric. They answered that they would "none of those things, nor receive him as their archbishop." The rest of my story is soon told. As we have read in the text, Augustine, on being rejected by the British ecclesiastics, violently threatened them with the vengeance of their enemies. It so happened that his prophecy was fulfilled, although not until after his own death. The English king, Ethelfrid, slaughtered the Britons, among whom were about twelve hundred priests and monks, a number which probably included all the British clergy, properly so called; for it must not be forgotten that we have already excluded the Welsh clergy from the British Church. That those who were slaughtered were Welsh is a mere matter of detail. And so, having fulfilled our duty and proved our case, we part with the British Church with feelings of pride. After the martyrdom of the twelve hundred British Christians, the Church of England goes to its well-earned repose of nearly a thousand years. Be it clearly understood, too, that it was only asleep, and not dead, during that long interval. If it had been our lot to chronicle the death of the British Church instead of her grateful sleep, we should have closed this volume with sorrowful reflections; but, as it is, we do so with profound relief. To the historian of the ancient Church of Lucius, which is none other than the Established Church of England, her falling to sleep is a matter of intense satisfaction. Nay more! If he could, he would have put her to sleep far sooner. One word more. The thought that the Church of England has had her long, refreshing slumber of many centuries, and has awakened, with renewed vigour, suggests that it is high time that the Church of Rome took her turn and went, metaphorically, to bed. She has been uncommonly wide awake during the last eighteen hundred years! I, for one, think that a thousand years of sound sleep would be very nice for her. Cannot the science of the nineteenth century devise a narcotic for this wakeful and restless patient? |