In Rome in 1847.   John Henry Newman dashed off his first novel, LOSS AND GAIN; OR, THE STORY OF A CONVERT. He had been provoked to do this by Elizabeth Furlong Shipton Harris, who wrote FROM OXFORD TO ROME, AND HOW IT FARED WITH SOME WHO LATELY MADE THE JOURNEY AND REST IN THE CHURCH). This anonymous novel told the first person story of a man who read much and moved through Anglicanism to Rome and then was sorry for it,Romet being not as good as anticipated.

Newman’s book was published anonymously and preceded by an “Advertisement.” It said that the novel was not pro-Catholic controversy but about a mental process “which issues in conviction of its divine origin.” And is ACTED UPON, I might add. It was not autobiographical. It was not about the Oxford Movement. Its principal characters were imaginary.

For myself, it is anything but autobiographical. The hero, CHARLES REDING, is younger than Newman when Newman left the Church of England and became Catholic.He is not as deep or multi-faceted as Newman. He stands aloof from the Oxford Movement.

Similarities between Charles and John Henry there admittedly are. Both love music and play the violin. Both study at Oxford. Both are Anglicans who are converted to Rome.

The entire text of LOSS AND GAIN is on line at
http://www.newmanreader.org/works/gain/

The hero is Charles Reding.

His best friend isSheffield.

Others of particular importance are

..........Bateman, a bore

...........White an Irishman, aesthetic Anglo-Catholic

----------Willis, White’s shadow
=========

PART I (of III)

Chapter I.  “Charles Reding was the only son of a clergyman, who was in possession of a valuable benefice in a midland county. His father intended him for orders, and sent him at a proper age to a public school.” The father thought of his son’s future and decided that he would face temptations in any setting: home schooling, private tutoring, public schools. He found all hearts mysteries, including his son’s.

Comment on the novel’s first sentence: “Charles Reding was the only son of a clergyman, who was in possession of a valuable benefice in a midland county.” Many a commentator sees huge amounts of autobiography hidden in this novel. I do not. In three points Charles Reding is not John Henry Newman. (1) Newman was one of three sons. (2) His father was a banker. (3) He was born and largely grew up in London.

In Chapter One the clergyman father concedes that he cannot penetrate into the soul of anyone, including his son. He would keep him a good person if he could, but believes temptation is anywhere: home schooling, public schooling, university. So he sends Charles out among the temptations of public schooling--to Eton. In their first sinning they innocently find out what sin is. Charles’s “active and inquisitive mind” (6) already challenges his father’s ability to answer him.

At Eton Charles had a good tutor who taught him “the old Church of England principles of Mant and Doyley” (6)

[Who were Mant and Doyley?  A candidate for Mant: Richard Man                                                                                                                                                                                                             1776-1848. Fellow of Oriel. Tutor. Irish bishop. wrote hymns. e.g. “Come Holy Ghost, Creator Blest.” Church histories. They collaborated on  DOY'OYLY, George Rev. and
  MANT, Richard Rev.

Notes, Explanatory and Practical, to the authorized version of the The Holy Bible, taken principally from the most eminent writers of the united church of England and Ireland.

This assumes Doyley is also DOY’OYLY.]

The main practical effect of religion on Charles was to allow him to resist “bad company” at school and later at Oxford. He joined St Saviour’s College and at the beginning of the novel is in his fourth term of residence (end of second year?). At Oxford, inevitably, friendship was based on proximity to the lodgings of other students. “And thus it was that Charles Reding was brought across William Sheffield, who had come into residence the same term as himself.” (7) Sheffield had lived more with older people, read much but without system and was into controversies of the day without taking much too heart. Charles was not yet deep but was deeper than Sheffield regarding “principles or their bearings” (7). “he was gentle and affectionate, and easily led by others, except when duty clearly interfered. From his father’s parish he was familiar “with various religious denominations” and had a general knowledge of their tenets. He would learn more of their other aspects as time marched on.

Chapter II.  Sheffield persuades Charles to go off with him on a long walk to the village of Oxley. They discuss old Jennings, a professor. Sheffield finds him boring; Reding finds some good in him.

 “I am for taking every one for what he is, and not for what he is not: one has this excellence, another that; no one is every thing. Why should we not drop what we don’t like, and admire what we like? This is the only way of getting through life, the only true wisdom, and surely our duty into the bargain.” 

They muse over a procession of Heads of Houses at St Mary’s, Oxford. Sheffield found much “fudge” (a favorite word) in academic religion. All outside without inside. A country parson led one service with “Ye shall pray.” “because old Latimer or Jewell said ‘Ye shall praie.’ (10) Sheffield: he continued “expecially for that pure and apostilic branch of it established ...established in these dominions,” Next came “for our Sovereign Lady Victoria, Queen, Defender of the Faith, in all causes and over all persons, ecclesiatical as well as civil, within these her dominions, supreme ...as though nature did not contain, as if the human mind could not sustain, a bigger thought.”

On their walk they fell in with a bore, a bachelor of Nun’s Hall, Bateman, who persuaded them to go a bit out of their way to visit a pre-Reformation chapel which Bateman and some friends were restoring. They will try to persuade the bishop to dedicate it to King Charles I. “why should we not have our St. Charles as well as th

e Romanists?” (12) The bells will sound for evening vespers.  Our group keeps up the Mass every Sunday “according to the rite of the English Cyprian, as honest Peter Heylin calls him” (12). The church had a tabernacle with no host and recesses for statues of saints and candlesticks without candles. They did not want to push farther than the bishop would allow.

[Peter Heylin: http://astext.com/history/5_2.html   HEYLIN, Peter (1600_62). Royalist historical writer. (07Jul80) 
[02/24/02: have searched net and written some emails about the “mass” of the English Cyprian. Heylin represented the Anglicans before Charles II on the new liturgy of 1662. No info yet on English Cyprian: Cranmer? See also 1789 US revisions which paid more attention to Puritan objections to 1662 text.]

Chapter III.  Both Charles and Sheffield were just beginning to form their intellectual centers. Sheffield actively sought out “views.” Charles at 20 was more passive. Fond of the maxim “we must measure people by what they are.” Love every one.  cf from a popular volume of poetry

...Christian souls, * * * 
Though worn and soiled with sinful clay,
Are yet to eyes that see them true,
All glisten with baptismal dew.”

[ 2/25/2: Source? Lyra Apostolica? Newman? Keble?]

Charles sounds rather broad church tolerant a la Coleridge and Thomas Arnold. Everything new was poetry to him. Neither friend was drawn to the Oxford Movement. Charles felt it bad taste to stand out in anything, be a leader, attract students. His goal at Oxford: a degree, not opinions (16) Yet (Newman) these were the most exemplary men of their day. Still the strength of th Anglican Church.

Chapter IV. 

[See http://www.geocities.com/CollegePark/1380/maria.htm
for Maria Edgeworth.   1767- 1849--age 82 in Ireland]

 The whole chapter revolves around the relationship between music and dancing and how that relates to the Church of England.

“You are like the man, in one of Miss Edgeworth’s novels, who shuts his ears to the music, that he might laugh at the dancers.”

Sheffield sees Bateman and his chapel restoration as taking a wrong headed approach to religion: exalting externals over internals. It’s humbug. Charles: you would scrape away the the roads till we had nothing to walk on--simply to get rid of the humbug on top of them.

Sheffield: Jeremy Bentham in CHURCH OF ENGLANDISM makes the case that we don’t need an enormously well trained cleric to read the Liturgy. Teach a parish boy to do it (21)  (2/26/2)

Chapter V. [Mr. Malcolm] On the walk back to Oxford Charles and Sheffield fall in with an older friend of Charles’s father, Mr Malcolm. He warns them that there are always fads and fashions at Oxford. They pass. Sheffield (23) asked what of the current (Oxord) movement? It has spread beyond Oxford, is talked of throughout England. Charles wished there were no parties and feuds. Oxford should be just for study and degree taking in peace and quiet.  Mr. Malcolm: the parties at Oxford quarrel as do religious orders of Rome. Or rather “Oxford is like an almshouse for clergymen’s widows.” Better than women’s gossip, nowadays, we quarrel about “the rivalry of intellect and conscience...; let us contend for things, not for shadows.” (24)

Chapter 6. [Breakfast with Bateman]  Sheffield’s distinction between realities and shams was beginning to make Charles think. Like any opionion which struck him, Charles chewed on it slowly to a conclusion. He was at the earliest stage of evaluating dogmatic truth versus latitudinarianism (25).

Bateman gave one of his usual breakfasts bringing people together of different views. His goal at this one was to draw the Evangelical master Mr. Freeborn, towards Catholicism. Flighty Irishman White speaks up for things Roman. They discuss Holy Week in Rome and the eating of blessed eggs. Freeman sees Catholic baptism (26) as deceit. How many churches are there? Are England and Rome parts of the same church? Or are there two churches which happen to agree in some important respects? Freeborn thought salvation took place independently of churches. Even Unitarians, asks Sheffield. “...it seems a man need not fear to believe too little, so that he feels a great deal.” (27)  Freeborn: there is no creed in the Bible. “neither Creed nor Church is religion.” (28) All ganged up on Freeborn except Willis. 

Bateman
("a bore") and shallow Anglo-Catholic gives a breakfast for a number of Oxford men. Here are excerpts:

http://www.newmanreader.org/works/gain/chapter1-6.html

Bateman, among his peculiarities, had a notion that bringing persons of contrary sentiments together was the likeliest way of making a party agreeable, or at least useful. He had done his best to give his breakfast, to which our friends were invited, this element of perfection; not, however, to his own satisfaction; for with all his efforts, he had but picked up Mr. Freeborn, a young Evangelical Master, with whom Sheffield was acquainted; a sharp, but not very wise freshman, who, having been spoiled at home, and having plenty of money, professed to be æsthetic, and kept his college authorities in a perpetual fidget lest he should some morning wake up a Papist; and a friend of his, a nice, modest-looking youth, who, like a mouse, had keen darting eyes, and ate his bread and butter in absolute silence.

They had hardly seated themselves, and Sheffield was pouring out coffee, and a plate of muffins was going round, and Bateman was engaged, saucepan in
hand, in the operation of landing his eggs, now boiled upon the table, when our
flighty youth, whose name was White, observed how beautiful the Catholic
custom was of making eggs the emblem of the Easter-festival. "It is truly
Catholic," said he; "for it is retained in parts of England, you have it in Russia,
and in Rome itself, where an egg is served up on every plate through the
Easter-week, after being, I believe, blessed; and it is as expressive and
significant as it is Catholic".  [NOTE: the quiet one is Willis. 3/3/2]

Chapter VII. [Anglican and Romish Churches one?] Freeman: only a right heart can interpret Scripture correctly (28). Sheffield: reasoning is only for the uncoverted. “It is the means of seeking.”  White: a world ruled by reason is a dull world. Religion is the beautiful. We have no poetry in the C of E. “The Catholic Church alone is beautiful.” Bateman: we can have Roman beauty in the C of E--without Roman corruptions. They look at plates of the Camp Santo at Pisa. Can their chapel be modified in that direction? Sheffield: what will you do with all those statues of saints? White: they will be allegorical figures.  A Catholic Pilgrim’s Progress.

Bateman and Sheffield left. Do C of E and RC make up one church? (32) But all the bishops call C of E “Protestant.” (34)

 Chapter VIII.   [White, Willis, and Misses Louisa and Charlotte Boltons]

White and Willis stroll arm in arm along Broad Street. Willis says he dislikes Freeborn and and older Evangelical layman Mr. Grimes and his tea parties for twenty. They go into a church. Odd that it is open (35). And old woman was dusting. They discuss how they might modify the church’s interior. They saw the pretty Miss Boltons...”very Catholic girls and really kind, charitable persons into the bargain.” They visited the old lady, helped her and were interested in her little grandchilcren. (36) They “did not know much of matters ecclesiastical, and they knew even less of themselves.” The four left church together and discussed how Catholic England was happily becoming. White’s first reform (37) would be to replace the old woman with a man in a surplice (cotta). “Impossible,” said Miss Bolton; “are women to remain Protestants?” The two sisters are sewing a cope. It will take only four more years. By then England will be wholly Catholic. Oxford might have a cardinal. Orders of nuns would reappear. The Chancellor could be a Knight Templar. White might become a Cistercian. “The nun and monk looked at each other very respectfully, and bowed; the other pair went through a similar ceremony; then it was performed diagonally.” (39)

At home, the sisters learn from their mother that they are too late for church. Therefore they will not go. Louisa Bolton says (40) “...but really it’s very sad to make worship so cold and formal a thing. Twice as manyh people woujld go to church if they might be late.” As is the case on the continent.

Chapter IX. [Dr. Brownside's Sermon] 

Per Wolff, GAINS AND LOSSES (258), Brownside is Renn Dickson Hampden, Regius Professor of Divinity (1836) , later Bishop of Hereford.
 

A solemn end of term sermon was preached by Very Rev. Dr. Brownside. Proof of Dr Johnson’s saying “all shallows are clear.”  (43) God may be inscrutable at some point; but fortunately for men he only revealed crystal clear truths to us. 

“He concluded with one word in favor of Nestorius, two for Abelard, three for Luther, ‘that great mind,” as he worded it, who saw that all creeds, rites, persons, were nought in religion and that the inward spirit, faith, ...was all in all.” (45)
This sermon made Charles uncomfortable. Every religious belief cannot possibly be true. Painfully, he saw that he could no longer take everyone as they were. 
 

Chapter 10. [Questions at a Tutor's Breakfast]   Charles took his first examinations, staying a few days longer at Oxford at end of term. Mr. Vincent, a junior tutor, asked him t dine in Common room on Sunday and on several mornings took walks with him. Had a touch of evangelical spirituality. Eschewed all persons, held all opinions (47). He refused to read products [of the Oxford movement.] About to go to Continent for a rest. Invited Charles and some others to breakfast. Vincent expatiated on Prof. Scaramouch’s theory of scents. Gases can cure. (49). Moves on to landscape colors of Italy and England. Charles defends England’s colors. (51) Rebuked Charles for seeming to go too far with questions in lectures, “wishing to form a system.” (51)  Avoid parties. Don’t hang around Oxford during vacation (or you will be suspected of being pro Oxford movement.} Our Oxford divines have done some good by pointing to Anglican laxity. But don’t BELIEVE them! (53)

Afterwards Charles realized he wanted practical guidance on what to believe and Vincent did not provide it. Why would his asking too many hard questions make people think he supported [the Puseyites?] (54)

11. [Encounter with Willis]   Willis (White’s umbra at Bateman’s breakfast) now cultivated Charles. Sees Willis coming out of what proves to be a Catholic church. Charles is horrified. Willis is not doing his duty to Oxford U. Willis says he is tugged toward the Roman church. C of E seems so lifeless. Charles says he knows nothing of Roman Catholics. But Willis is an intruder among Catholics. Walking home, Charles muses: what if Rome is true? I am left to myself (57)

12. [Long Vacation at Home]   Peace and quiet after all the opinions of Oxford. Mr Malcolm visited the parsonage after years of absence. He and Curate Reding discuss the fruits of Oxford. Mary says Charles things scent the most intellectual of the senses. Malcolm prefers sounds. Charles: no, sounds extend in time. Scents engulf us at once. Sights take up space. They compare snuff and alcohol. Urges Charles not to be an old bachelor.

Mary and Charles talk in the garden. Mary says, come what may to us as individuals, our family will remain as one. (64) Charles is vexed that Malcom provokes him, still almost a boy, to plan out his future decisively. Mary says his family will support him. Charles: people part--David and Jonathan, Paul and Barnabas. Only one never changes. With Him we have everything, no matter what else we lose.

13. [Willis turns Catholic]    En route back to Oxford in October, Charles stops in London on business. Received a letter from Willis (63). He would not return to Oxford. Charles sought him out. In company with a slightly older cradle Catholic man, Mr. Morley. He was received RC in France. Willis tries to rush Charles off to a priest to be received. Reding would not be hurried. “Morley now struck in: he spoke all along like a gentleman, and a man of real piety, but with a great ignorance of Protestants, or how they were to be treated.” (69) Afterwards to himself: of course, Charles enquires. “... but every Protestant inquires; he would not be a Protestant if he did not.” (70) Catholics begin with faith, Protestants with inquiry. He remained reconciled to his position to stay C of E. 

14. [Is the Creed in Scripture?]  Back in Oxford on first day of Michaelmas term. In rushed Sheffield.  He says Oxford is panicking over conversions to Catholicism. Jesuits involved. The pope was sighted. Charles tells of Willis’s conversion. He would be less surprised at White. Sheffield: White will never turn. He is a coward. Willis is merely a fool (72). Charles: if there is anything I like about RC, it is their firmness about what they believe. “Now you are a Puseyite,” said Sheffield in surprise. (73) Vincent was mushy in his advice to Charles.  (74) Pusey is decisive. Read Coventry, an American congregationalist. Coventry says there is no creed in Scripture (75). Therefore there is no creed. And so to bed. (75)

15. [Lecture on the Articles]  A bad mistake for Charles’s peace of mind: his tutors sent him that term to a tutor’s (Mr Upton’s) lectures on the 39 Articles. Charles “saw that the profession of faith contained in the Articles was but a patchwork of bits of orthodoxy, Lutheranism, Calvinism, and Zuinglism; and this too on no principle; that it was but the work of accident...it might have come down in any other shape; that it was but a toss up that Anglicans at this day were not Calvinists, or Presbytgerians, or Lutherans, equally well as Episcopalians.” (76) Charles asked Upton many questions, got slippery answers. Charles did not give his doubts to Sheffield but did speak with Bateman. Bateman said that there are many interpretations of the Articles [note: including Newman’s, almost certainly]. But no bishop held the Catholic reading. They are more than “articles of peace.” Your theory of a Catholic reading of the Articles might have worked, “had it been tolerably sanctioned.” “It is, as it stands, a mere theory struck out by individuals.” (82)
 

16. [Freeborn on Faith]    In two chapters Charles begins his and the novel’s final effort to root himself in Evangelicalism. What is faith is the theme? Freeborn approached Charles in a park. Faith is the instrument of our justification in God’s sight. Faith is like a hand, a reaching out toward God. Faith alone justifies (84). Get faith and justification right and external things, including sacraments and creeds become secondary. Faith both justifies and regenerates, therefore begets good works, too. Faith is a clinging as a poor beggar might do to a king’s garments. Freeborn said I eat bread and benefit from it without knowing what was in it. But what, asked Charles, if it had arsenic in it? (85) You understand faith only after you have it (87). Don’t put Luther on a level with the Anti-christ Pope. But Charles remembered as a boy going into a Catholic church and being impressed by the great devotion of the worshipers. Does faith carry its own evidence with it? Yes, said Freeborn. But can’t people be deluded whether they have true faith or no? Faith justifies before and without charity, before works. (88) Charles concluded that Freeborn was his friend but not clear headed.

17. [Tea with Evangelicals]  Freeborn invited Charles to tea with five or six Evangelicals. All held different views of faith. But they knew the story of the recent conversion of Pope Sixtus the Sixteenth by the evangelical Mr. O’Niggins. [NOTE: even as recorded, the Pope conceded nothing but RC doctrine. 3/5/2]

In the discussion Charles found that grace via baptism was something concrete, while self-perception of having faith was subjective, hidden, unpersuasive. The Evangelicals dispute about Luther v. Melanchthon. Reding slipped away. He decided to do no further inquiring into Evangelicalism (93). 

18. [Death of Reding's Father]   Charles’ father dies suddenly. Charles goes home and stays there until January. His father had been a good, simple pastor who took care of the poor and his family. This death was the first great grief and loss in Charles’s life. It made theological niggling at Oxford look petty. He resolved to be like his father, finish his studies and avoid further controversies. If C of E, warts and all, was good enough for father and family, it would do for Charles, too. A leaf had been turned in his life. “Charles had left Oxford a clever, unformed youth; he returned a man.” (96)
==============

Part II

1.  [Charles and Sheffield tutored by Carter]  Charles’s father’s death is 1 1/2 years in the past. The two friends rent lodgings near Horsley to prepare for “the schools,” final exams nearly a year in the future. Their tutor is  Carter. Charles has not consciously immersed himself in religious “party” disputes at Oxford. Sheffield finds Carter weak on forming a big picture of details. They discuss what are parties: in Greece, in England, at Oxford, in the C of E? Extra constitutional influence. (99) A necessity in the state of nature on the way to law-bound society. Parties supplement institutions and laws. Influences compete with influences (101). Agitation is the influence of underrepresented poor classes. Mr. Vincent comes cantering up for supper. (102)

2. [The role of parties at Oxford.] Parties are not good but may be necessary. Vincent: from the clash of opinions emerges truth (103). In parties the reprobate labor for the elect!  Vincent: plenty of people like to be in parties--necessary or not. Carlton: when a church does not decide a controversy, it leaves freedom to individuals to decide for themselves. (104) Protestant private judgment and toleration make parties inevitable. In Rome allows “slender private judgement,” the C of E vastly broader. Vincent: rumor has Willis about to return to C of E (106). Political parties do not make men rebels. After dinner they discuss beverages and camomile flowers as preventing flatulency. Vincent leaves. What of present party leaders at Oxford [Pusey, Newman]? “...the existence of parties is no fault of theirs. They are but claiming their birthright as Protestants. When the Church does not speak, others will speak instead....the formation of a party is reather the act of those who follow than of those who lead.” (109)

3.  [White tells of Willis.]  White faces exams and is cramming into six months two years of neglect. White had been calling at Mr. Bolton’s in Oxford. A party of five forms walking home from Oxford (White to Chalton). Upton is leaving: a sound lecturer on Agricola. Getting a good living and 500 pounds/year. The Dean of Selsey thunders against St Mary’s [Newman]. White has heard Newman preach “as most men have” (111) but he makes one dissatisfied with the C fo E. White: Willis has returned from abroad and is living at home. Willis now believes Romanism and Anglicanism are two separate religions and cannot be reconciled or amalgamated. Willis did not seem to encourage others to follow him. 

4.  [White will marry.]  Carlton, Sheffield and Reding talk after dinner out of doors about White. What has altered him from a playful kitten to a dull tabby? (113) Why has he flip flopped on clerical celibacy? Celibacy is a passing fancy. All will marry within ten years. Charles tells Carlton he can confide in him as he can in no other. (114)  Charles: I have “some sneaking kindness for * * * celibacy myself.” Since a boy at school I have fancied “that I should never marry.”  Carlton: you will fail to introduce celibacy to C of E.  Carlton: the genius of Anglicanism is against it. C of E has produced few celibate giants. Some bishops virtually to compel a married clergy. (116)

5.  [Celibacy --continued]  Carlton: does not GENESIS commend fertility? Charles: celibacy is supernatural--not unnatural. Look at St Paul. Charles: should we not do penance for sine? (119) Don’t fasting, abstinence, celibacy “make up for sin?” (119) Recall Dr Johnson standing in the rain at Lichfield as penance for a boyhood sin v. his father. Celibacy both perfects nature and is a penance.

6. [Reflection by Newman: Minds must grow.] “It is impossible to stop the growth of the mind.” After two years of paying no attention to religious controversy, Charles’s religious views have nonetheless progressed. He could not worship God without beliefs. “He might not realize his own belief till questions had ben put to him; but then a single discussion with a friend...would bring out what he really did hold... (120)  [NOTE: elsewhere Newman says that the Apostles were that way. They might not know what orthodoxy was until asked. Then they would respond correctly.] Charles was only 22. But he professed in a one hour informal conversation with Carlton “the Catholic doctrine and usages, of penance, purgatory, councils [sic!]of perfection, mortification of self and clerical celibacy.” Outside the church groping for it is like a man in the dark with a lantern. Private judgment is unavoidable; but entering the house you put out the lamp. (121) The searcher finds a system confirming and fulfilling private ideas. (122) He sees Catholicism as the ancient faith of England and still that of the larger part of Christians worldwide. Of Charles: “what a mystery is the soul of man!” As his mother had said, he could not escape his destiny. “...the destiny of being one of the elect of God. ...yet come it must, it was written in Heaven, and the slow wheels of time each hour brought it nearer)...his destiny of becoming a Catholic. ..so the strange unknown odor, pleasing to some, odious to others, went abroad from him upon the winds, and made them marvel what could be near them, and made them look curiously and anxiously at him, while he was unconscious of his own condition. Let us be patient with him, as his Maker is patient, and bear that he should do a work slowly which he will do well.” (123) Charles was growing one way, Sheffield another. See below.

7.  [Sheffield’s liberal views of the C of E]  Carlton and his two pupils walked to the small church he was serving. St Matthew’s day in the Long Vacation. Carlton then to attend a sick man. Sheffield and Reding walked home. Sheffield called  Carlton a “party man” because he read the Athanasian Creed at service without being required to. (123) Charles: but the Prayer Book said to do it. Sheffield: is that direction now binding? Sheffield: ten years ago an Oxford man [Newman] was going to publish a history of the Nicene Council. A wise [high church] clergyman urged him not to put a picture of Athanasius as preface. Athanasius “was a very unpopular name among us.” (124) Charles: theological language is a learned language. Time was when divines read the Fathers and the scholastics. Time was when they stopped reading. Then started again. [NOTE: THIS ALLOWS US TO DATE THIS EPISODE TO +/- 1842] Sheffield: most high churchman receive this dogma or that unreflectingly and without applying it to their lives. We are surrounded in the C of E by anti-Athanasian Sabellians. These clergymen (127) say they are not bound to the details of the Creed  “only to the great outline that there is a Trinity.” Charles: a Unitarian could say that! Sheffield: the Tractarians have made it increasingly difficult for broad minded Christians (e.g. Priestley) to be counted any more as true Anglicans. (127)

Sheffield: “There are four parties in the Church.” (1) Tory or country party is the largest and “has no opinion at all.: (128) It treats the Catholic faith with respect but shows no sign of “holding” it. (2) The Liberal party: anti-Creed, too. (3) Evangelical: implicitly Sabellian. Mainline continental Protestants tend to unitarianism. (4) [not specifically described, but presumably the Tractarians=Athanasians.] Charles: is belief in the creed mere party opinion? Sheffield: “But surely one has no need to believe what so many people either disbelieve or disregard.” (129)  [Athanasius once stood against the world! 3/7/2]

8.  [Return of the 39 Articles]  After two years the Articles returned to bit Reding. He spoke with two intimate friends as much bound by the Articles as he. Carlton said all systems had their defects. Even Judaism, straight from God as it was, had to be removed because of its unprofitableness.  Charles lists contradictions and fudging in the Articles. Carlton: all religions have their forms antedating us. You must choose. You cannot invent. The Articles come (unlike the Creed) on no authority. Carlton: consider our Church AS IF infallible, “from a sense of duty.” (131) There is a church with a greater claim than C of E. The Roman system may be hard, but it is consistent, which is not enough to make it true. A consistent system at least does not condemn itself. (132) Amidst Freeborn and his Evangelicals I found Luther and Melanchthon disagreeing on the prime point of justification by faith. “...there is no prophet of truth on earth, or the church of Rome is that prophet.” A visible church must be a prophet. 

Marks of a prophet: consistency, allows no rival, is at home with God’s message, is not helpless amidst errors. I trust Rome, though am not sure she is true. “But I do not feel the like trust in our own Church. I love her more than I trust her.” (134) “She leaves me without faith.” Carlton: the Romans have more problems with consistency than you think. Infallibility. Indulgences. Charles: If Rome is as inconsistent as C of E, then I am on road to becoming a sceptic or at least a Latitudinarian. I don’t see how I can subscribe to the 39 articles (to get my degree).

9.  [Oxford anti-Catholic spies.] In October the friends returned to University. Reding no longer as intimate, of one mind, with Sheffield. “...Sheffield’s whole heart was in his work, and religion ws but a secondary matter to him.” He did not perceive the Christian’s need for the Unseen. (137) Unblemished character. “..but content with what the perishable world gave him.” Charles’s defining characteristic:”sense of the Divine presence.” “the pillar of the cloud before him and guiding him.” Wanted academic success but a few minutes would reconcile him to failure. Sheffield could not help Charles in his religious difficulties.

“...there was at that time a system of espionage prosecuted by various well-meaning men.” Called to Heads of houses any young men “papistically inclined.” Charles had been on trial at Freeborn’s party. An inquisition. He became a maked man. Held against him: acquaintance with Willis, questions in Articles course, stray remarks at wine parties. People surreptitiously looked over books in his study and bedroom. With some people warnings worked. e.g.with White. “it was a kill-or-cure remedy,” less effective with more noble, able minds.  Next: interviews with Principal and Vice Principal of his College as a result of the spy system (138)

(10) [Charles is ostracized from Oxford.] 
 
 

Part III

Chapter I. [Taking leave of his Mother]

Chapter II. [BOOKSHOP IN BATH]

Charles stopped off in Bath on business en route to a final visit to Oxford and Carlton. He went to a religious bookstore to pick out a few books to help him prepare to be received as a Catholic when he reached London. In the back of the shop amid unpopular Catholic books, he heard the shop door open “...and, on looking round, saw a familiar face. It was that of a young clergyman, with a very pretty girl on his arm, whom her dress pronounced to be a bride. Love was in their eyes, joy in their voice, and affluence in their gait and bearing.” (204) 

[Was this Louisa Bolton, the elder of two “Catholic” sisters (Louisa and Charlotte) White and Willis met in I.? Chapter VIII? Almost certainly. 2/28/2]

Chapter III. [Views in Religion
 
 
 

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

Contents

        [There are no chapter titles in this book-NR.]

       Part I.
1. [Charles Reding]

2. [A Bore]

3. [Views in Religion]

4. [Piscinæ and Candelsticks]

5. [Mr. Malcolm]

6. [Breakfast with Bateman]

7. [Anglican and Romish Churches one?]

8. [White, Willis, and Miss Boltons]

9. [Dr. Brownside's Sermon]

10. [Questions at a Tutor's Breakfast]

11. [Encounter with Willis]

12. [Long Vacation at Home]

13. [Willis turns Catholic]

14. [Creed in Scripture?]

15. [Lecture on the Articles]

16. [Freeborn on Faith]

17. [Tea with Evangelicals]

17. [Questions]

18. [Willis at Bateman's]

19. [Bateman pursues Willis]

20. [A sympathetic Soul]
.
21. [Return for Examination]
 

                                         Part III.

1. [Taking leave of his Mother]

2. [Bookshop in Bath]

3. [Farewell to Oxford]

4. [Talk of Reding]

5. [Parting from Carlton]

6. [Oxford to London-Conversation with a Priest]
.
7. [Irvingites and other Visitors]

 8. [Truth Society, Spiritual Elixir]

9. Mr. Malcolm]

10. [The Pashionist Convent]

11. [Conclusion]

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
02-27-2002
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

=============

SOURCES AND COMMENTS:

--Owen Chadwick, THE SPIRIT OF THE OXFORD MOVEMENT: TRACTARIAN ESSAYS. 1990, 1995. Thesis: Newman was a good historian but a poor novelist (189) Bremond agreed.

--Charles Stephen Dessain, JOHN HENRY NEWMAN. 1966. 1971. (94) For years after the long agony of his “Anglican deathbed,” Newman was happy and full of energy. “While in Rome he wrote his first novel, LOSS AND GAIN, about an Oxford convert, the amusing reply to a story, FROM OXFORD TO ROME, by a Miss Harris, which was having a great success in England. Newman’s hero belongs to the younger generation of Oxford Tractarians {I THINK NOT! TPK 2/10/2002.}, so that only occasionally is the story autobiograhical...Newman is Smith, ‘he never speaks decidedly on difficult questions.’

--Joyce Sugg, SNAPDRAGON: THE STORY OF JOHN HENRY NEWMAN. 1964. 1982. (118) After JHN’s ordination Pope Pius IX sent little band of Englishmen outside Rome to a house called Sant Croce, taught to be Oratorians by dreary Father Rossi. Wrote LOSS AND GAIN there. “it was an account of Oxford and religious opinions there, and of the conversion to Rome of one yung man called Charles Reding. Passers-by Newman’s room would hear him chuckling there. Has some good funny parts. Why was he writing it? To help a recently converted Catholic publisher. James Burn’s first Catholic book, LOSS AND GAIN.

Meriol Trevor, NEWMAN’S JOURNEY.

--Sheridan Gilley. NEWMAN AND HIS AGE. See 38, 255, 370

p. 255 gives a good sense of some themes around which to build a lecture.

--why written? to compensate publisher James Burns on loss of his Anglican clientele.

--analyzes muddle and incoherence of Newman’s journey towards the church
and its over sensitive and melancholy hero, Charles Reding. (portrait of Newman).

--readers noticed:

----wicked sense of fun
----in portraits of
-------High
-------Low

-------Liberal   Cof E men

------over-earnest and humourless Evangelical

------frivolous Anglo-Catholic dandy-aesthete

------astute Latitudinarian “who knows how little he can safely believe.”

--FRASER’S MAGAZINE: a book of jokes and gossip, of eating and drinking, of smartnesses, levities and most probable personalities

somewhat undignified for a hitherto putative Anglican Saint and Prophet.

--conversation pieces

----tea-table gossip of Evangelicals pondering Sixtus XVI’s conversion to Protestantism

----shop talk of subcultures of C of E...devastating exposure of inconsistencies, insincerities and occasional silliness of the rival schools of Anglican theology.

7/9/2
=========