 Section 14 of Rational Theology and Christian Philosophy, Volume 1, by John Tulloch. This LibriVox recording is in the public domain. Chapter 5. William Chillingworth, the Bible, the Religion of Protestants, Part 2. We hear little of him otherwise during these years. All that we do here tends to show the liberal direction of his theological studies. He expresses himself in regard to Arianism as at least no damnable heresy in the view of the opinions of the Antinousine Fathers, to which he gives detailed references. He was offered preferment in the Church of England, but felt himself unable to accept it, on the ground of inability to subscribe the thirty-nine articles. His position in this latter matter is interesting, particularly as he afterwards, on further consideration, abandoned it. He objected mainly to the Athanasian Creed, which, as well as the Nicene and the Apostles Creed, it is said in the articles, ought thoroughly to be received and believed, before they may be proved by most certain warrants of holy scripture. He disapproved of the damnatory clauses of this Creed. He could not apprehend, and much less affirm, that anybody should perish everlastingly, for not thinking of the doctrine of the Trinity as therein expounded. He thought that it was great presumption, thus to confine God's mercy, and that such a declaration tended to create animosities and divisions in the Christian Church. He had difficulties also respecting the Fourth Commandment, which he did not acknowledge to be binding upon Christians, as the prayer-book seemed to make it. He wrote at length to his friend Dr. Sheldon, setting forth his scruples, and declaring that he would never do anything for preferment, which he could not do but for preferment. Extended Footnote This letter, long as it is, deserves to be quoted in full. Whatever may be thought of its arguments, and the somewhat excited tone of feeling which it betrays, it at least sets in a striking light the noble sensitiveness of Chillingworth's character. The letter is dated from two, September 21st, 1635, and is as follows. Quote, Good Dr. Sheldon, I do here send you news, as unto my best friend, of a great and happy victory, which at length, with extreme difficulty, I have scarcely obtained over the only enemy that can hurt me, that is, myself. Sir, so it is, that, though I am in debt to yourself, and others of my friends, above twenty pounds more than I know how to pay, though I am in want of many conveniences, though in great danger of falling into a chronicle infirmity of my body, though in another thing, which you perhaps guess at what it is, but I will not tell you, which would make me more joyful of preferment than all these, if I could come honestly by it, though money comes to me from my father's purse like blood from his veins or from his heart, though I am very sensible, that I have been too long already, and unprofitable burden to my lord, and must not still continue so, though my refusing preferment may perhaps, which fear I assure you, does much afflict me, be injurious to my friends and intimate acquaintance, and prejudicial to them in the way of theirs, though conscience of my own good intention and desire suggests unto me many flattering hopes of great possibility of doing God in his church service, if I had that preferment which I may fairly hope for, though I may justly fear that by refusing those preferments which I sought for, I shall gain the reputation of weakness and levity, and incur their displeasure whose good opinion of me, next to God's favor, and my own good opinion of myself, I do esteem and desire above all things, though all these, and many other, terribilace visu for me, have represented themselves to my imagination in the most hideous manner that may be, yet I am at length firmly and unmovably resolved, if I can have no preferment without subscription, that I neither can nor will have any. For this resolution I have but one reason against a thousand temptations to the contrary, but it is a mega against which, if all the little reasons in the world were put in the balance, they would be lighter than vanity. In brief this it is. As long as I keep that modest and humble assurance of God's love and favor which I now enjoy, and wherein I hope I shall be daily more and more confirmed, so long, in despite of all the world, I may and shall and will be happy. But if I once lose this, though all the world should conspire to make me happy, I shall and must be extremely miserable. Now, this inestimable jewel, if I subscribe, without such a declaration as will make the subscription no subscription, I shall wittingly and willingly throw away. For though I am very well persuaded of you and my other friends who do so with a full persuasion that you may do it lawfully, yet the case stands so with me, and I can see no remedy but for ever it will do so, that if I subscribe, I subscribe my own damnation. For though I do verily believe the Church of England, a true member of the church, that she wants nothing necessary to salvation and holds nothing repugnant to it, and had thought that to think so had sufficiently qualified me for a subscription, yet now I plainly see, if I will not juggle with my conscience, and play with God Almighty, I must forbear. For, to say nothing of other things, which I have so well considered as not to be in state to sign them, and yet not so well as to declare myself against them, two points there are wherein I am fully resolved, and therefore care not who knows my mind. One is, that to say the fourth commandment is a law of God appertaining to Christians is false and unlawful. The other, that the damning sentences in St. Athanasius is creed, as we are made to subscribe it, are most false and also in a high degree presumptuous and schismatical, and therefore I can neither subscribe that these things are agreeable to the word of God, seeing I believe they are certainly repugnant to it, nor that the whole common prayer is lawful to be used, seeing I believe these parts of it certainly unlawful, nor promise that I myself will use it, seeing I never intend either to read these things which I have now accepted against, or to say amen to them. I shall not need to entreat you not to be offended with me for this my most honest and, as I verily believe, most wise resolution, hoping rather you will do your endeavor that I may neither be honest at so dear a rate as the loss of preferment at so much dearer a rate, the loss of honesty. I think myself happy that it pleased God when I was resolved to venture upon a subscription without full assurance of the unlawfulness of it, to cast in my way two unexpected impediments to divert me from accomplishing my resolution. For I profess unto you, since I entertained it, I have never enjoyed quiet day nor night till now that I have rid myself of it again. And I plainly perceive that if I had swallowed this pill, howsoever gilded over with glosses and reservations, and wrapped up in conserves of good intentions and purposes, yet it would never have agreed nor stayed with me, but I would have cast it up again, and with whatsoever preferment I should have gained with it as the wages of unrighteousness which would have been a great injury to you and to my Lord Keeper, whereas now, raceist integra, and he will not lose the gift of any preferment by bestowing it on me nor have any engagement to Mr. Andrews for me. But however this would have succeeded in case I had then subscribed, I thank God I am now so resolved that I will never do that while I am living and in health which I would not do if I were dying, and this I am sure I would not do. I would never do anything for preferment which I would not do but for preferment, and this I am sure I should not do. I will never undervalue the happiness which God's love brings to me with it as to put it to the least adventure in the world for the gaining of any worldly happiness. I remember very well, great, a premium regnum de et cetera omnia addisienturtibi, and therefore whenever I make such a preposterous choice I will give you leave to think I am out of my wits or do not believe in God or at least am so unreasonable as to do a thing in hope I shall be sorry for it afterwards and wish it undone. It cannot be avoided, but my Lord of Canterbury must come to know this my resolution, and I think the sooner the better. Let me entreat you to acquaint him with it, if you think it expedient, and let me hear from you as soon as possibly you can. But when you write I pray remember that my foregoing preferment, in this state wherein I am, is grief enough to me, and do not you add to it by being angry with me for doing that which I must do or be miserable. I am your most loving and true servant, et cetera." It has been strangely represented in the view of this letter, and Chillingworth's subsequent statements about the meaning of subscription, prophesied page 35, as if he had at length forced his conscience to the point desired by Sheldon and, so to speak, gulped down all his difficulties under a hollow compromise with his better feelings. Is it not rather plain, in the light of such a letter, that Chillingworth must have reached his new conclusions through the exercise of the same conscientious thoughtfulness with which he held his old ones? A man does not change or lose his character when he changes his intellectual conclusions. Chillingworth's first attitude towards subscription may appear to some minds the more consistent and higher attitude. But this is no evidence that it is so in reality, and still less is it any warrant for supposing that it must have continued to seem so to Chillingworth himself notwithstanding his change of action, and that therefore the only explanation of this change is to be found in his having dealt so far dishonestly with his own convictions. For this is what the charge comes to. On the contrary, nothing seems more natural or intelligible than Chillingworth's change of attitude. In his letter to Sheldon he is in all the enthusiasm of a young inquirer. Subscription appears to him to imply not only assent to the general doctrine of the Athanasian creed as, thoroughly to be received and believed, in the words of the Eighth Article of Religion, but also personal acceptance of its damnatory clauses. The Fourth Commandment, again, appeared to him in its strict interpretation to be a merely Jewish law, and therefore false in its application to Christians. He was unable in either case to separate the essential from the accidental. He had much less capacity than his friend Hales of doing this at any time, and an eager spirit of theological enthusiasm is almost always narrow in its intensity. But in the course of two years further reflection Chillingworth came to see these points, and probably other points, in a different light. He recognized, we may suppose, as so many have since done, that the damnatory clauses of the Athanasian creed are not an integral part of the creed in the sense of the Eighth Article, the very attitude taken up by the high minded and thoughtful Bishop of St. David's at the time we write. See Guardian, March 27, 1872. Beyond doubt also he came to see that subscription cannot mean to any rational and fully intelligent mind direct personal assent to all the particulars of a creed. This is really a higher and more thoughtful, if less enthusiastic, attitude than that expressed in his letter. But higher or not is not really the question. The only question is, may it not be an equally honest attitude? And can we doubt that it was so in the case of Chillingworth, and that he was therefore as truly conscientious and ultimately consenting to subscribe, as in at first refusing to do so? Critics are surely both ignorant and presumptuous who venture to insinuate a denial of this, and from their own unintelligent standpoint to constitute themselves the arbiters of the honesty of one whose intellectual depth and subtlety they so little understand, and the latchet of whose theological shoes they are not worthy to unloose. End of Footnote Sheldon replied, and several letters passed between them. Unhappily there have only been notes of these letters preserved. But it appears from the notes that Chillingworth, besides objecting to various details in the articles, objected to the principle of articles in general, as an imposition on men's consciences much like that authority which the Church of Rome assumes. Sheldon seems to have taken up his objections in detail and done his best to remove them. He did not spare at the same time the sort of advice which is always ready on such occasions. Be not forward, nor possess to the spirit of contradiction. We have no indication of the exact effect of his friend's arguments or advice upon Chillingworth, but his mind worked itself clear of its scruples before long. A passage in the close of the preface to which we have already referred probably gives us the best insight into his motives for ultimately subscribing the articles and accepting preferment. For the Church of England he says, quote, I am persuaded that the constant doctrine of it is so pure and orthodox that whosoever believes it and lives according to it undoubtedly he shall be saved, and that there is no error which may necessitate or warrant any man to disturb the peace or renounce the communion of it. This, in my opinion, is all intended by subscription, close, quote. In this practical and sensible ground he had previously repudiated in his letter to Dr. Sheldon, but further reflection had convinced him of its soundness. With his convictions there was indeed no other ground on which he could serve the Church of England or any other Church. There are certain minds, and Chillingworth's was one of them, that see difficulties in every argumentative form of doctrine. Their rational inquisitiveness makes them acutely sensitive to the limits of human knowledge in all directions and the dogmatic meanings which human controversy has imposed upon the simple creed of the Gospel strongly repel and at times disturb them. These meanings may or may not be true, God alone knoweth, but what such minds feel is that they are not for man to settle, they are in their nature not matters of faith but matters of doubt and controversy, and they are therefore properly open questions which all should be left to settle humbly for themselves in the light of holy scripture. No Church here to fore has been so wise in this respect as the Church of England. Even Lod appreciated religious difficulties too well not to welcome such service as Chillingworth's under whatever reserves it might be rendered, and Chillingworth felt himself at length able to serve the Church of England notwithstanding his scruples. I am ready to subscribe, he virtually said, to all that in my opinion is or can be intended by subscription. I belong to the Church of England. I have not only no wish to renounce her communion but I am willing to be her minister, supposing that it is enough that I approve generally of her doctrine. This approval is what I design by subscribing the articles. In these articles good men of former times have done what they could to express their highest Christian thought against the perversions of heretical curiosity. They would have succeeded better if they, in their turn, had been less curious if they had refrained from defining where scripture itself has refrained. But upon the whole I acknowledge their doctrine, or at least I have no wish to dispute it. I accept the articles as articles of peace." Whether subscription can ever mean more than this to certain minds may be held doubtful. It must also be admitted that it does mean more to others and that there are even minds which do not understand this point of view but really see in controversial statements of former times every word of which to the historical theologian bears trace of forgotten conflict, an expression of devout faith rather than a triumph of dogma. The difficulty is as to the cooperation of these two classes in the great work of the Christian Church. The uninquisitive, unreflecting faith which accepts without hesitation the dogmatic decisions of the fourth and fifth, and even of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, can it harmonize with the critical faith which reads as in sunlight all the weaknesses and exaggerations of these decisions and cannot help acknowledging them? The question is a vital one for the Christian Church. The rights of faith are beyond challenge, but criticism surely has also its rights, and if they cannot live and work together the Church of the future seems a somewhat dark and hopeless puzzle. Chillingworth soon began to pay the wanted penalty of having thoughts of his own about religion. This reasoner who had reasoned himself into popory and reasoned himself back to Protestantism and who had doubts about the Athanasian creed and the fourth commandment and even the necessity of creeds all together, was he not plainly a Sosinian? There seemed no other way of accounting for his changes and scruples. He must certainly be held to be a dangerous person against whom the public should be cautioned lest he lead them astray by his arguments. Such was the device of his opponents. Hearing that he was engaged in a defense of Protestantism, it seemed an ingenious plan to prejudice the public against him by accusing him of Sosinianism, and the Jesuit to whose book he was replying accordingly issued a pamphlet entitled, Directions to be Observed by N. N. if he means to proceed in answering the book entitled Mercy and Truth or Charity Maintained by Catholics. This pamphlet is little else than a series of scurrilous insinuations. Diverse common heresies, especially Sosinianism, are imputed to Chillingworth, and he is counseled to, quote, declare his own opinions plainly and particularly and not think to satisfy by a mere destructive way of objecting such difficulties as upon examination tend to the overthrow of all religion no less than of Catholic doctrine, close quote. The trick common to religious partisans is cleverly employed of representing him in virtue of his questioning convictions and rational hesitations as being opposed to all supernatural verity and sound doctrine. He has scrupled at the Athanasian creed. He is represented as destroying, quote, the belief of the most blessed trinity, the deity of our dear Lord and Saviour, and of the Holy Ghost, original sin, and diverse other doctrines which all good Christians believe, yea, and all besides that cannot be proved by natural reason, close quote. He has questioned the infallibility of the Pope, and he is represented as overthrowing the infallibility of all scripture both of the Old and New Testament. He is asked to answer whether, quote, his arguments lead not to prove an impossibility of all divine supernatural infallible faith and religion that either hath been, or is, or shall be, or possibly can be, close quote. It might have been thought that it remained to later times to invent the ingenious mode of theological warfare which consists in calling your opponent an infidel, and because he does not accept your view of the Gospel alleging that he does not believe the Gospel at all. But the device is really a very old one. It certainly was not unknown to the 17th century, and Chillingworth had to bear the brunt of it in a very painful form. But whatever pain he may have suffered he was not to be deterred from his task. The Jesuit had invited all to contemplate the sort of champion to which Protestantism was reduced. What greater advantage, he asked, could we wish against Protestants than that they should trust their cause and possibility to be saved to such a champion? But the champion was, all the while, amid the academic quiet of Oxford and the retirement of Great Tew, preparing his armory for the encounter. He was not a man to be daunted by the mere abuse of fanaticism, popish or Puritan. He knew his own mind too well. The subject filled and animated him by its highest inspirations. He saw in it a great argument at once for divine truth and human freedom. And at the end of 1637 he gave to the light the religion of Protestants a safe way to salvation or an answer to a book entitled Mercy and Truth or Charity Maintained by Catholics. This great work claims a separate and detailed examination. In the meantime we follow out the thread of Chillingworth's personal history to its sad close. After the publication of the Religion of Protestants, which strangely enough met the approval not only of Archbishop Laud but the King, Chillingworth was offered, and accepted, the chancellorship of Sarum along with the pre-bend of Bricksworth, and in the year 1640 he represented the chapter of Salisbury as their proctor in Convocation. In this manner he became a party to the subsidy voted to the King by Convocation, a vote which greatly incensed the House of Commons. This appears to have been his first step towards a more close association with the royalist party in the impending troubles. It is not easy for us to analyze or appreciate all the motives which influenced Chillingworth in this great crisis. All his personal predilections and feelings, like those of his friend Lord Falkland, were strongly enlisted on the side of order, and whatever may have been his rational distrust of many of the principles put forward by the royalists, he was still more widely separated both by rational conviction and personal feeling from the opposite party. He failed, like his friend Hales, to appreciate the great movement of political liberty with which Puritanism was identified. He failed even more remarkably to see that there was a close affinity between this movement and the religious liberty so dear to him, and affinity equally unrecognized by the majority of Puritans themselves, but not the less real because unseen by so many on both sides. On the other hand, the characteristic dogmatisms of Puritanism were strongly distasteful to him. Its intolerance revolted him, yet with all we wonder at his zeal and are touched with pity at his fate. We admire, and yet we mourn for, him as for Falkland, strange that the friends who had so often speculated on the course of events, who had marked the excesses and risen far above the prejudices of either side, should have been thus hurried into the thick of the conflict and perished before its real issues had become apparent. A sermon preached by Chillingworth before his majesty at Oxford in 1643 to 4, the first in the series of nine which formed the most part of the third volume of the Oxford edition of his works, gives us the only insight into his views and feelings at this time. We can see very well from it that while there is no wavering in his personal devotion to the cause which he had embraced, and while his sentiments towards the king personally seemed to have been those of true affection, he yet recognizes the gloomy character of the crisis and how much there was on both sides to alienate and offend sober-minded Christian men. Publicans and sinners on one side, he says, quote, against scribes and Pharisees on the other. On the one side hypocrisy, on the other profaneness. No honesty nor justice on the one side, and very little piety on the other. On the one side horrible oaths, curses and blasphemies. On the other pestilent lies, calamities and perjury. When I see among them the pretense of reformation, if not the desire, pursued by anti-Christian, Mohammedan, devilish means, and amongst us little or no zeal for reformation of what is indeed amiss, little or no care to remove the cause of God's anger towards us by just, lawful and Christian means, I profess plainly that I cannot, without trembling, consider what is likely to be the event of these distractions. There is the same tone of half-despair here which made Falkland lay down his life on the field of Newbury, weary of the times and foreseeing much misery to his country. It would have been well for Chillingworth if he had perished like his friend in battle, what must be considered a harder fate was reserved for him. There is something so singular in the story of his death, the persecution to which he was subjected, and the circumstances attending his burial, that we have some difficulty in comprehending and crediting them, all, however, seems to rest on undoubted evidence. Chillingworth had accompanied the King's forces to the Siege of Gloucester, August 1643. He was not content to be a mere spectator of the war-like movements, but, observing that the army wanted materials for carrying on the Siege, he suggested the invention of some engines after the manner of the Roman Testudenes Complutes in order to storm the place. What might have been the effect of these engines it is impossible to tell, for the advance of the parliamentary forces under Essex compelled the royalists to raise the Siege. In the end of the same year Chillingworth, out of kindness and respect to the Lord Hopton, accompanied him in a march into Sussex, where he took and garrisoned Arundel Castle. Being indisposed by the terrible coldness of the season, Chillingworth remained with the garrison, which was but ill provided with supplies, and soon broke into factions. It was, in consequence, easily recaptured by Sir William Waller and Chillingworth, out of health and out of spirits, became a prisoner. He continued so ill that he could not be removed with the garrison to London, but was conveyed to Chichester. This act of kindness he has said to have owed to a person painfully associated with his last days, Francis Chainel, a noted Puritan divine of his day, but whose name is now entirely forgotten. He had been a fellow of Merton College, and, according to Dr. Calamy, possessed considerable learning and abilities. The fact of his having been appointed one of the assembly of divines at Westminster may perhaps be taken in evidence of this. Whatever may have been his previous training at Merton, he had now developed not merely into a zealous Presbyterian, but, as one describes him, a rigid zealous Presbyterian, exactly orthodox, very unwilling that any should be suffered to go to heaven but in the right way. In the beginning of this same year he had published a tract on the Rise, Growth, and Danger of Sosinianism, in which, along with others, Chillingworth was violently assailed. The full title of this tract is, quote, The Rise, Growth, into Danger of Sosinianism, together with a plain discovery of a desperate design of corrupting the Protestant religion, whereby it appears that the religion which hath been so violently contended for by the Archbishop of Canterbury and his adherence is not the true, pure Protestant religion, but an hutch-putch of Arminianism, Sosinianism, and Popory. This pamphlet was printed by order of the House of Commons in 1643. End of footnote. The principles of the religion of Protestants are repudiated in this tract as destructive and un-Christian, and the allowing a chance of salvation to the papists is denounced as a miserable weakness. It was Chillingworth's unhappy fate to encounter this violent dogmatist after the capture of Arundel Castle, and it is to Chano's own pen that we owe the description of his conduct which would be otherwise quite incredible. His narrative bears the following title which of itself is a revelation of the character of the man. Chillingworthy Novissima, or the sickness, heresy, death, and burial of William Chillingworth, in his own phrase, clerk of Oxford, and in the conceit of his fellow soldiers, the Queen's arch-engineer and grand intelligencer, set forth in a letter to his eminent and learned friends, a relation of his apprehension at Arundel, a discovery of his errors in a brief catechism, and a short oration at the burial of his heretical book by Francis Chainel, late fellow of Merton College. In a secondary and more special title is an axed to the epistle or dedication to Chillingworth's friends, among them Pridot, Bishop of Worcester, Sheldon, afterwards Archbishop, Dr. Potter, and morally Canon of Christ Church, namely, quote, a brief and plain relation of Mr. Chillingworth's sickness, death, and burial, together with a just censure of his work, by a discovery of his errors, collected and framed into a kind of atheistical catechism fit for Rakovia or Cracovia, and may well serve for the instruction of the Irish, Welsh, Dutch, French, Spanish Army in England, and especially for the Black Regiment at Oxford, close quote. Such is the extraordinary title of one of the most extraordinary pamphlets that even the blind and mad ranker of religious zeal ever produced, a truly ludicrous as well as melancholy instance of religious madness. The tract sets out with a low gossiping narrative of Chillingworth's unpopularity with the officers of the Royal Army, as being supposed to be the Queen's intelligencer, and as interfering unnecessarily with his advice in their warlike councils. A gentleman is represented as informing Chainel that Chillingworth was so, quote, confident of his great wit and parts that he conceived himself able to manage marshal affairs in which he hath no experience by the strength of his own wit and reason. You may forgive him, adds our divine, for though I hope to be saved by faith yet Master Chillingworth hopes that a man may be saved by reason, and therefore you may well give him leave to fight by reason, close quote. And so on. We are then told what care Mr. Chainel took of the poor sick man's body. There is no reason to doubt, apparently, his being animated by a certain kindness of heart. But while he took care of his body, he, quote, dealt freely and plainly with his soul. When I came again to him, after he had given Chillingworth a brief period to refresh himself in his sickness, I asked him whether he was fit for discourse. He told me, yes, but somewhat faintly. I certified him that I did not desire to take him at the lowest when his spirits were flattered and his reason disturbed, close quote. Having the great reasoner in his power, he thirsted to engage him in argument, ill and feeble as he was. He would not take him at a disadvantage, yet his orthodox ardor could not be restrained. Chillingworth was not the man to shrink from argument while he could, and dying as he was, he responded to the invitation to defend himself. According to Chainel's statement, he made various concessions regarding the war which were satisfactory, and he was moved to spare him further disputation. But, nevertheless, their controversy continued till the Puritan finally pressed Chillingworth with some statement he had made against the course taken by Parliament, that war is not the way of Jesus Christ. What, asked the Puritan, quote, are not the saints to make war against the whore and the beast? Is it not an act of faith to wax valiant in fight for the defense of that faith which was once delivered to the saints? I perceived, he adds, my gentleman somewhat puzzled, and I took my leave that he might take his quest. I gave him many visits after this first visit, adds our pamphlet here, but I seldom found him in a fit case for discourse because he grew weaker and weaker. It seems a hard fate, even for a disputant like Chillingworth, to have been killed by such remersalist process. Day by day his sickness grew, and the vanity of all human talk must have seemed more and more to him. But the Puritan's voice gave him no peace. The Puritan's zeal flamed the more hotly as the great reasoner seemed passing beyond the strife of tongues to wear beyond those voices there is peace. He expressed a disinclination to argue the merits or demerits of the Book of Common Prayer. I was sorry, says Chainel, to hear such an answer from a dying man. When I found him pretty hearty one day, he pursues, quote, I desired him to tell me whether he conceived that a man living and dying at Turk, Papist, or Sosinian could be saved. All the answer I could gain from him was that he did not absolve them and would not condemn, close, quote, an indecision which was far from satisfactory. The dying man be sought an interest in the charity of his disputant, for, sayeth he, I was ever a charitable man, quote. My answer was somewhat tart, and therefore more charitable, considering his condition and the counsel of the Apostle, Titus 1.13, rebuke them sharply that they may be sound in the faith. And I desire not to conceal my tartness. It was to this effect. Sir, it is confessed that you have been very excessive in your charity. You have lavished so much charity upon Turks, Sosinians, Papists, that I am afraid you have very little to spare for a truly reformed Protestant, close, quote. It is a curious and painful picture which the zealous divine draws of himself. Seldom have the contrasts which religion may present been more singularly exhibited. Let us rejoice that it is not unmixed by some genuine traits of human kindliness. While he spared not the soul, Chanel carefully consulted for the bodily relief of the dying theologian whose heresies were yet so damnable to him. Quote, I sent to a carergen, one of Mr. Chillingworth's belief, an able man that pleased him well and gave him some ease, and I desired the soldiers and citizens that they would in their prayers remember the distressed state of Mr. C., a sick prisoner in the city, a man very eminent for the strength of his parts, the excellency of his gifts, and the depths of his learning. We prayed heartily that God would bless all means which were used for his recovery, that he would be pleased to bestow saving graces as well as excellent gifts, that he would give him new light and new eyes, that he might see, acknowledge, and recant his errors, that he might deny his carnal reason and submit to faith. I told him that I did used to pray for him in private, and asked him whether it was his desire that I should pray for him in public. He answered yes with all his heart, and he said with all that he hoped he should fare the better for my prayers. The heart owns to some softening here. The humanity is not all absorbed, even beneath the hardening scales of such divinity as chanels. Yet the tenderness is but for a moment. It soon disappears, and the very last hours of the dying man are not sacred from coarse intrusion. Nay, the theologian seems to have reinforced his own polemical energy by a, quote, certain religious officer of Chichester Garrison who followed my suit to Mr. Chillingworth and entreated him to declare himself in point of religion. But Mr. Chillingworth appealed to his book again, and said that he was settled and resolved, and therefore did not desire to be further troubled. He expressed a wish to be interred, if possible, according to the custom of the Church of England. If not, the lords will be done. And so he departed into the silent land. He fell asleep and was taken to that rest which, like many others before and since, he had not found on earth amidst the strife of tongues and the noise of theological captains shouting for battle. He died in January 1644. The day of his death is not exactly known. If Mr. Chainel's narrative had stopped here, it would have been painfully interesting enough, but not so absolutely startling as it really is. The most extraordinary part remains. Now that the heresy arc, who would not explicitly recant his errors on his deathbed, was dead, how was he to be buried? There were three opinions, he says, quote, the first, negative and peremptory that he ought not to be buried like a Christian, seeing that he had refused to make a free and full confession of the Christian religion and had taken up arms against his country. Second, that, being a member of a cathedral, he should be buried in the cathedral. Being consularious, he should be intracancelos. And third, the opinion which prevailed, that the men of his own persuasion, out of mere humanity, should be permitted to bury their dead out of our sight and to inter him in the cloisters among the old shavlings, monks, and priests of whom he had so good an opinion all his life, close quote. Accordingly, Chillingworth was laid by his own people in the cloisters of Chichester Cathedral. As devout Stephen was carried to his burial by devout men, so it is just and agreed, says Chainel, that Malignance should carry Malignance to their grave. He takes care to tell us also that there were no torches or candles at the grave, for the Christians, according to Tertullian, used no such custom, although the heathens did, and the anti-Christians now do. There was a scene, however, prepared by Mr. Chainel himself, far more expressive than any procession of torches or candles. When the Malignance, says he, brought his hearse to the burial, I met them at the grave with Master Chillingworth's book in my hand. And there, with a speech which he recounts, he buried the book while they buried its author. Quote, If they pleased to undertake the burial of his corpse, I shall undertake to bury his errors, which are published in this so much admired yet unworthy book, and happy would it be for the kingdom if this book and all its fellows could be so buried. Get thee gone, thou cursed book, which hast seduced so many precious souls. Get thee gone, thou corrupt rotten book. Earth to earth and dust to dust. Get thee gone into the place of rottenness that thou mayest rot with thy author and seek corruption. So spoke a Christian divine, in the middle of the seventeenth century, a member of the Westminster Assembly, afterwards placed at the head of St. John's College, Oxford, where Laud, not many years before had been president, of the religion of Protestants a safe way to salvation. Words would fail to do justice to the painfulness of the picture. Let us rather draw down on it the merciful veil of silence. It needs not criticism, it baffles it. Yet it was meat that the veil should be lifted, if only for a moment, to show how ugly religious zeal may become, how hateful it looks even across two centuries as it stood and cursed by the grave of Chillingworth. Of Chillingworth's personal character it is unnecessary to add much. Clarendon's sketch is graphic, like all his other sketches, but it leaves a good deal to be desired and certainly is not touched as we have already hinted with any special tenderness. The fondness with which he lingers over the portrait of Falkland and even of Hales no longer softens his pen. He does justice, however, to Chillingworth's great subtility of understanding, his incomparable power of reason and admirable eloquence of language. He commends, moreover, his rare temper in debate. It was impossible to provoke him into any passion. And so, he adds, it was very difficult to keep a man's self from being a little discomposed by his rare sharpness and quickness of argument. His almost unrivaled power of touching the weakness of other minds who ventured to dispute with him, combined with such a faculty of composure on his own side, may have made Chillingworth somewhat unpopular and even unamiable beyond his own circle. He certainly had the capacity of exciting intense asperity in his opponents. It is impossible, with all, to doubt that he was a man of generous impulses and true warm-heartedness, an earnest, fearless, able man with a higher tenderness which is seldom dissociated from true courage, incapable of a mean thought and ready to make any sacrifices for what he deemed the truth. When he heard of Falkland's death at Newbury, he wept bitterly for the loss of his dear friend. As to what Clarendon says of his inconstancy and propensity to change, this is merely the natural view which a statesman and a man of the world takes of a restlessly inquisitive intellect whose thoughts he cannot measure. There was no levity in any of Chillingworth's changes. They were only varying attitudes of spiritual aspiration. The same deep sincerity and sleepless search after truth animate and guide him throughout. Of his personal appearance we have indications both from Clarendon and Aubrey. But there is no portrait of him as far as we know. He was, the former says, of a stature little superior to Mr. Hale's. It was an age in which there were many great and wonderful men of that size. He was a little man, says Aubrey, with blackish hair, of a Saturnine countenance. CHILLINGWORTH'S GREAT WORK by which alone he can be said to be remembered. It sums up all his thought and has taken its place in English literature as a monument of Christian genius. His other writings are comparatively unimportant as they are comparatively unknown. A few sermons, nine in all, a series of tracks under the name of additional discourses, most of them mere sketches or studies for his great work, and a brief fragment more significant than the rest entitled The Apostolical Institution of Episcopacy Demonstrated comprise the whole. The sermons are marked by the vigor both of thought and language which is always characteristic of him, but are not in any special manner interesting or valuable. They contain nothing which would have preserved his name from oblivion, and but little to remind us of the bold thought of the religion of Protestants. In a still less degree than the few sermons of Hooker attract notice beside the laws of ecclesiastical polity do Chillingworth's sermons serve to draw attention away from the work with which his name has become identified. The tract on Episcopacy possesses a distinct value as showing the liberal direction of the author's mind on a subject in which his feelings, education, and the eventful turns of his life strongly interested him. He had not only been trained an Episcopalian in the School of Lod, but all his natural love of order and ardent affection to the royal cause had enlisted his sympathies on behalf of the existing government of the Church. But no degree of personal prepossession is able to obscure in him the light of rational thought on this any more than on the general subject of religion. Episcopacy is to him in its essentials, quote, no more but this, an appointment of one man of eminent sanctity and sufficiency to have the care of all the Churches within a certain precinct or diocese and furnishing him with authority, not absolute or arbitrary, but regulated and bounded by laws and moderated by joining to him a convenient number of assistants, to the extent that all the Churches under him may be provided of good and able pastors, and that both of pastors and people conformity to laws and performance of their duties may be required, close quote. Such a form of government he maintains is not repugnant to the government settled in and for the Church by the Epistles, nor is it incompatible with the reformation of any evil either in church or state or the introduction of any good which it may be desirable to introduce. The brief argument of the tract is confined to the demonstration of the first of these propositions and is throughout of the most moderate and reasonable character. He quotes the evidence of two great defenders of Presbytery, Molinaeus, Dumoulin, and Beza in favor of Episcopacy being the recognized order of Church government presently after the Apostles' times, and draws the usual inference from this admitted antiquity on behalf of its being the institution of the Apostles themselves. With the validity of such an inference it is unnecessary to concern ourselves. It appeared to chilling worth's mind in every respect a fair and dispassionate one in the light of which the anti-episcopal dogmatism of the Puritan Presbyterian party seemed utterly unreasonable. To vindicate the institution of Episcopacy from the abuse of this party and show its claims to a rational historic standing is the sole aim of his argument in which aim he is completely successful. Any further claim for it as a positive use divinum is inconsistent alike with his object in the tract and with the whole tone of his thought and reasoning. It now remains for us to consider his chief work, the Religion of Protestants' A Safe Way to Salvation. This work presents itself to our examination in two points of view, first in his general intellectual and literary character, and secondly in its substantive argument and meaning, or in other words in reference to the great principles which it sets forth. It might be further considered in its controversial details, some of which are aside from the main purpose of the work and well deserving of attention as illustrative of its logical method and force. But as our purpose in these sketches is not to revive controversy or to adjust rivalries long since forgotten, but only to fix the significant ideas which have influenced the course of religious thought and permanently enriched it, it is unnecessary as it would be useless for us to go over the particular points in the polemic between our author and his Jesuit opponent, further than it may be important to do so for our general purpose. 1. The Religion of Protestants claims first to be considered by us as one of the most notable productions of English literature. What are its claims to occupy such a position? What are the distinguishing characteristics of its thought and style? In judging it from our modern standard in such matters, we are struck at first by a certain imperfection and clumsiness of form arising out of its controversial purpose. The reader is naturally anxious to get into the heart of the subject and see what a writer of such name has to say about it. What are the strong points of his argument, and how he lays them down and expounds them in relation to one another? In a modern book on the subject, of any remarkable ability, we would probably find ourselves thus carried to the center of interest at once, and made to recognize the great lines of thought characteristic of the opposing sides and the claims that the one rather than the other has to his following. The modern mind, whatever it may have lost, has certainly gained in organizing power, in the capacity of surveying a subject in its whole outline and disposing of it in proportion to the relative importance of its details. In controversial literature particularly this has been a great gain. It has tended to fix attention upon the real differences of thought out of which all minor differences spring, and to deliver the reader from mazes of detailed argumentation which, however ably conducted, have often little or no bearing upon the main points at issue. In Chillingworth's time, controversy, and especially theological controversy, was still a conflict of details. It is one of his excellences that he is superior in this respect to many of his contemporaries. Yet, with all his advance, the religion of Protestants suffers greatly from being in form a detached reply to a forgotten book. The reader has to wade through, in successive chapters, the arguments of the author of charity maintained, his Jesuit opponent not, and in many cases also the statements of Dr. Potter to which the Jesuits' work was a reply. The real pith of the subject is only reached sometimes after all these repeated processes of statement and reply when the author is at liberty to follow the unembarrassed course of his own thought. The work opens with a preface addressed to the author of Charity Maintained, mainly in answer to a pamphlet entitled by him a direction to N. N. This preface, as we formerly remarked, is full of interest for the light which it throws on the formation of Chillingworth's opinions, and is marked by great dignity and elevation of tone. Then follows the preface of the author of Charity Maintained, and Chillingworth's reply to this, anticipatory of many points upon which he afterwards dwells more fully. Then, in succession, through seven chapters, the argument of his Jesuit opponent is given first, and his answer in detail follows. Every point is carefully met, and amidst so many minute particulars of argument there is necessarily a good deal of recurrence of thought. The reader gets impatient of interruptions and of the multitude of steps by which he advances to the close of the controversy. It is obvious that only rare attributes of thought and style could have risen above these disadvantages of form, and given unity and life to such an accumulated mass of controversy. But we have scarcely opened the book when we see evidence of these. We find ourselves in contact with an intellect of singular strength and brightness of clearly penetrative and powerful thoughtfulness which grasps the whole subject and moves unconfused amidst its details. Strength and earnestness, genuine grasp of mind and large intelligence are Chillingworth's highest characteristics. Some minds have shown more extent of scope and certainly far more richness and glow of speculative comprehension in conducting a great argument. In these respects Hooker is incomparably superior, and Jeremy Taylor, in his liberty of prophesying, moves with a freer and more sustained air. But neither Hooker nor Taylor equals our author in mere mass and energy of mind and the masculine robustness and downright honesty generally associated with such simple strength. The very height at which more imaginative writers sometimes soar gives a certain indistinctness to their thought. It gains in coloring and impressiveness at the expense of plain outline and meaning. But the meaning of Chillingworth is always plain and always strong. He evades no difficulties and never flinches for fear of consequences. He grapples heartily with every statement of his opponent, meets it with the pure force of reason, and brings it to the ground without any hesitation. He is ready for battle at every point and has never any doubt of the keenness of his weapons or the force of his blows. Next to the strength and straightforwardness of his intellect his most remarkable characteristic is fairness. No fairer controversialist, we believe, ever entered the lists. He never takes an undue advantage of his opponent. He is tender to him personally while unsparing to his arguments. He had himself been caught in the toils amongst which the Jesuit was struggling, and while he pursues and unwinds the entanglements one by one, he never does so in a contemptuous spirit. His magnanimity is beautiful, considering the character of the attacks to which he was subjected by Romanists and Puritans alike. He grows warm and indignant at times, and he uses firm language, especially when he resents the imputation of atheism and irreligion, but he never smites as they sought to smite him. We know of no personality that ever escaped his pen. A half-tender, half-compassionate, God forbid I should think the like of you, or for God's sake free yourself from the blind zeal for a little space, is the utmost to which he yields. Of all theologians of the seventeenth century, of any century perhaps, Chillingworth is one of the most thoroughly fair, candid, and open-minded. Temporarily a convert to Romanism, and actually for a while the inmate of a Jesuit seminary, the transparency of his manly and earnest spirit is never for a moment dimmed. The same love of the truth, and the same keenness in its search, inspire him from first to last. The idea of upholding a system merely because he had embraced it, or an institution because he happened to belong to it, would have been unintelligible to him. His mind could rest in nothing short of clear and definitely reasoned convictions. He must see the truth for himself and be able to give some reason for it, why he held to it, and why he rejected the contrary. It was this that made men who misunderstood his point of view accuse him of inconstancy and religion, and allege that, according to his principles, a man could be constant in no religion, as he could not understand a mere blind adherence to any system merely because he had once accepted it, so they could not understand his continual inquisitiveness and determination to see the truth more clearly. Why constantly be asking what is the sense of scripture, what religion is best, what church purest, come, do not wrangle, but believe? This, which is virtually what his puritan opponent said to him, represents the alternative state of mind. According to a common place of almost all religious parties, a man is supposed to be unsettled in religion if he is constantly asking questions, if his mind is restlessly moving towards what seems to him a higher light, while the religious inquirer, on the other hand, has no idea of religion which does not involve constant inquest and movement. It is to him of the very nature of religious thought to be always moving, to be always rising and so changing its relation to human systems. Certainly Chillingworth's mind was of this order. Truth was to him one, but its very simplicity made it all the more difficult to seize, and while he kept his eyes steadily fixed on it, he was constantly re-adapting his attitude towards it and trying to get a clearer sight of it. Footnote. He thus describes his own changes in religion very much in the spirit we have described them here and in the preceding pages. Quote. I know of a man that of a moderate Protestant turned a papist, and the day that he did so, as all things that are done are perfected some day or other, was convicted in conscience that his yesterday's opinion was an error, and yet, methinks, he was no schismatic for doing so, and desires to be informed by you whether or no he was mistaken. The same man afterwards, upon better consideration, became a doubting papist, and of a doubting papist a confirmed Protestant. Even yet this man thinks himself no more to blame for all these changes than a traveller who, using all diligence to find the right way to some remote city where he had never been, as this party I speak of had never been in heaven, did yet mistake it and after find his error undemendant. Nay, he stands upon his justification so far as to maintain that his alterations were the most satisfactory actions to himself that he ever did, and the greatest victory that ever he obtained over himself and his affections to those things which in this world are most precious, and whereas for God's sake, and as he was really persuaded, out of love to the truth, he went upon a certain expectation of these inconveniences which to ungenerous natures are of all the most terrible, so that although there was much weakness in some of these alterations, yet certainly there was no wickedness. Neither does he yield his weakness altogether without apology, seeing his deductions were rational and out of some principles commonly received by Protestants as well as papists, and which by his education had got possession of his understanding. Close quote. End of footnote. It is this earnest high-mindedness, this spirit of healthy rationality which gives such elevation, purity and dignity to Chillingworth's thought. He is superior to all commonplace of his church or school, all mere professionalism, and nothing perhaps more marks the great writer in any department than this superiority. A writer who is unable to rise above the level of his profession, may be acute, learned, and able, he may be a great authority on his own subject, but he will never take a place in the world of thought and literature. In order to do this he must show himself capable of rising above traditional or official limits and of perceiving the truth in its own light and vindicating it on the highest grounds of reason. In all special departments of intellectual work, and particularly in theology, the highest minds have been of this order. They have been thoroughly competent in their own department, but also marked by a healthy openness of thought in other directions. They have always recognized something higher than professional canons of opinion and carried the breath of nature, so to speak, and of universal reason into their work. It is this which makes the distinction between such a writer as Hooker and Andrews, for example. The latter, a man apparently of far more special ability than Hooker, he is said to have been master of fifteen languages, but infinitely inferior in breadth and capacity of thought, forgotten except by a few theological students who turn occasionally to his sermons. While Hooker continues, and will ever continue, one of the great classics of English literature. It is this which distinguishes our author, and sets him far above most of his theological contemporaries, either Anglican or Puritan, Hammond or Sanderson on the one side, and Owen to take the very highest example on the other. In contrast to such writers, Sillingworth is a man of general and not merely of special theological culture. He shows himself capable not merely of handling particular doctrinal points after the best manner of his school and of bringing logical skill and erudition to bear upon their support and illustration, but, moreover, of dealing with questions in their most generalized intellectual shape and of bringing them to the test of the higher reason of all men. And so it is that the religion of Protestants, like the laws of ecclesiastical polity, has an unfading interest to the common educated intellect and not merely to the theological student. It remains, although in a less degree than the great work of Hooker, a living force in general literature, a permanent monument of thought marking the advance of the human mind in the loftiest of all directions. It is especially this higher thoughtfulness, this touch of light from the altitudes of a divine philosophy which gives any life to theological polemics. However able, ingenious or successful for the time and argumentative work may be, if it have nothing of this, if it never soar beyond the confines of its special subject nor start any principles of general application, it will be found to lose hold of the succeeding generations and gradually to pass from the ranks of literature. It may be sought after and highly prized by certain minds, but the progressive intelligence finds no meaning in it. It may have served a cause, silenced an enemy, and even gained a distinguished victory, but it has done nothing to advance the course of thought. It has opened no tracks which have been further cleared and expanded, and so it passes out of sight and deserves to do so, great as may have been its temporary reputation. It is a distinct gain to literature that an oblivion, frequently rapid, always sure, should thus overtake the great mass of controversial writings which contains so little that is fitted to elevate or enrich human thought. To be forgotten is their happiest fate, but let a fair, generous, and noble reason like hookers or chilling-worths irradiate a controversy and it acquires permanent life and interest. It becomes a mirror of higher truth and men return to it in after-generations to study the principles which it helped to elucidate and to refresh themselves in its light. The style of chilling-worth is the natural expression of his thought. Simple, strong, and earnest, occasionally rugged and vehement. Particularly like his thought it is without any artifice. He is concerned with what he has to say, not with his mode of saying it, and having thrown aside almost all the scholastic pedantries which in his time still clung to theological style, he gives fair play to his native sense and vigor. His vehemence is apt to hurry him into disorder, but also often breaks into passages of lofty and powerful eloquence. If we compare his style with that of hooker or bacon, it is inferior in richness, compass, and power, but superior in flexibility, rapidity, and point. It turns and doubles upon his adversary with an impetuosity and energy that carry the reader along and serve to relieve the tedious levels of the argument. If he must be ranked upon the whole greatly below such writers as we have mentioned, he is yet in this, as in other respects, much above most of his contemporary divines. The pages of Lod, or of his biographer Halein, or even of Hammond, are barren and unreadable beside those of the religion of Protestants, and even the richer beauties of Taylor, embedded amidst many pedantries and affectations, Paul in comparison with his robust simplicity and energy. With writers of the ordinary Westminster school, like his opponent, Chainel, it would be absurd to compare him. They are utterly without grace, life, or power. Even the best Puritan writers, like Hau and Baxter, scarcely reach in their best passages his manly and inspiring eloquence. II Let us now turn to the argument of his work, and especially to the principles on which it rests. The main question which it raises is the always vital one as to the grounds of religious certitude. How are we to know the truth in religion? On what basis must faith rest? Who or what is the arbiter of religious opinion? This is the great issue between him and his Romanist opponent. It is unnecessary for us, we have already said, to take up the successive details of assault and retort between them. But it is important for the sake of clearness to understand the manner in which they approach each other, the line of their controversial march towards the great principles in which the chief interest of the discussion lies. After a detailed answer to the preface of the author of charity maintained, the argument opens with the question of charity as between the two sides. Is it uncharitable for papists to maintain that Protestants cannot be saved? This had been the special question between Nott the Jesuit and Dr. Potter, the one maintaining that Protestancy unrepented destroys salvation, the other that want of charity is justly charged on all Romanists who affirm this proposition. Chillingworth takes up the controversy from this point. The first pamphlet of Nott was published in 1630. Potter's answer in 1633. And then in the following year the Jesuit returned to the charge in Mercy and Truth or Charity Maintained by Catholics, and it is to the successive chapters of this book printed in front of his own that Chillingworth replies. In his opening chapter the Jesuit holds to his point, but not without the qualifications repeated to our own day by all exclusive sacerdotalists, Anglican or Roman. Quote, Our meaning is not that we give Protestants over to reprobation. We hope, we pray for their conversion. Neither is our censure directed to particular persons. The tribunal of particular judgments is God's alone. Want of opportunity of knowing Catholic truth. Want of capacity to understand it. Light declaring to mend their errors or contrition retracting them in the moment of death are allowed as excuses. In such particular cases, says Nott, we wish more apparent signs of salvation, but do not give any dogmatical sentence of perdition. In his answer Chillingworth makes good use of the concessions of his opponent as to the salvability of Protestants. The question is no longer, he says, Quote, Simply whether Protestancy unrepentant destroys salvation as it was at first proposed, but whether Protestancy in itself, apart from ignorance and contrition, destroys salvation. Nott has admitted, in short, that a Protestant may be saved if he be either an ignorant Protestant, not having had the means or capacity of knowing any better, or if he joined with his Protestantism the antidote of a general repentance. Though Protestants may not be saved at so easier rate as Papists, yet even Papists being the judges, they may obtain salvation. Heaven is not inaccessible. Their errors are not impracticable by the differences between them and salvation. Nothing can be finer than the courteous sneer with which Chillingworth points his reply here, all the more impressive that he seldom indulges in this vein. For my part, he says, Quote, Such is my charity to you that considering what great necessity you have, as much as any Christian society in the world, that the sanctuaries of ignorance and dependence should always stand open, I can hardly persuade myself so much as in my most sacred consideration to divest you of these so-needful qualifications. But when soever your errors, superstitions, and impieties come on to my mind, my only comfort is that the doctrine and practice too of repentance is yet remaining in your church, and that though you put on a face of confidence of your innocence in point of doctrine, yet you will be glad to stand in the eye of many as well as your fellows, and not be so stout as to refuse either God's pardon or the king's." He then engages to meet his opponent on the more limited question, as he concludes it to be, whether Protestantism possesses so much natural malignity as to be in itself, apart from ignorance and contrition, destructive of salvation. The combatants start with an acknowledged proposition on both sides. The chilling worth grants that there must be a visible church stored with all helps necessary to salvation, and further that the church must have sufficient means of determining all controversies in religion which are necessary to be determined. But sufficient is not with him the same as effectual, a distinction he urges which his opponent cannot overlook. For that the same means may be sufficient for the compassing and end, and not effectual, you must not deny, who hold that God gives to all men sufficient means of salvation, and yet that all are not saved." Nor is it requisite that all controversies whatsoever but only such as involve salvation should be determined. Here, where so much of the general argument is to rest, he discriminates his ground carefully from the first. The end, he says, must be the measure of the means here and everywhere. Quote, If I have no need to be at London, I have no need of a horse to carry me thither. If I have no need to fly, I have no need of wings. So if I can be saved without knowing this or that definitely, I have no need to know it. The church needs no means for determining points in which salvation is not involved. Is it necessary that all controversies in religion should be determined, or is it not? Quote, The question, plainly put, contains its own answer even to the Romanist, in whose church, as in all churches, many questions remain undetermined or open questions. So far, therefore, there is common ground between Schillingworth and his opponent. They advance up to a certain point on the same line of argument. There must be a visible church in possession of the means of salvation. This primary generality raises no discussion. Further, they agree that there must be within the church an arbiter of religious truth some infallible means of religious certitude. The latter expression, with both writers, comes to the same thing as the former. Where there are means of religious certitude there are means of salvation. And Schillingworth is content to use the word infallible no less than his opponent. The means of deciding controversies on faith and religion, he grants, must be endued with a universal infallibility in what it propoundeth for a divine truth. But here the apparent agreement between them proves to be entirely hollow. The words they use have not the same meaning. Religious truth is not the same thing to each. Their mode of reaching it is entirely different. The question, in short, of the determination of religious truth or what is necessary to salvation opens up their antagonism from its roots. All the other points of their argument branch off from this and are virtually settled by the conclusions to which they come here. While avoiding the details of the controversy it may be useful to exhibit, in a table, the course of discussion as it unfolds itself in successive chapters. This may be stated as follows, confining ourselves as much as possible to the language used by Schillingworth and his opponent. 1. The question as to religious certitude, or the means whereby the truths of revelation are conveyed to our understanding and controversies in faith and religion are determined. 2. The distinction of points fundamental and not fundamental, whether it is pertinent in the controversy. 3. The question whether the Apostles Creed contains all fundamental points or all points necessary to be believed. 4 and 5, whether separation from the Church of Rome constitutes schism and heresy, and 6, which is a mere corollary from 4 and 5, whether Protestants are bound in charity to themselves to become reunited to the Roman Church. A mere glance at this table serves to show how the whole controversy is really summed up in the twofold question as to the source of religious truth and the character or sum of this truth. To this question, therefore, as handled by our controversialists, we address ourselves. It assumes a very speedy and direct issue. The source of religious certitude, the infallible means of determining religious truth, not says, is the Church, by which, of course, he means the Roman Catholic Church. Take away the Roman principle of infallibility, and all religion falls to the ground. None can deny the infallible authority of the Church are his words, but he must abandon all inspired faith and true religion if he but understand himself. Again, if the infallibility of such a public authority be once impeached, what remains but that every man is given over to his own wit and discourse? The principle of not, therefore, was the principle of the Church's infallible voice. Is any man in doubt? Let him ask the Church. The Church is divinely authorized to pronounce what is true and what every man is therefore bound to believe. This principle, whatever practical difficulties may be involved in it, is, at least, in its generality, intelligible and consistent. The position of Schillingworth, as opposed to this principle, is the well-known Protestant adage, so often quoted in his own words, the Bible and the Bible only is the religion of Protestants. The Bible, not the Church, is the organ of religious truth and the only rule of faith. This is the Protestant principle asserted by our author and professed by all Protestant Churches in its generality. But the merit of Schillingworth, of course, does not consist in his having enunciated this general principle. It did not remain for him to do this. It is his interpretation of the principle which constitutes all his distinction as a religious thinker, which could alone have given him any distinction. It is plain, for example, that when it is said to a man, the voice of the Church is authoritative, or, on the other hand, the voice of Scripture is authoritative, that the man is not greatly helped in a practical point of view, for he must then immediately ask, how am I to be sure of the voice of the Church, or how am I to be sure of the voice of Scripture? It is here that the real pinch lies. To take an illustration there are ultra-anglo- Catholics who start from the same principle as the Roman Catholics, with both of whom the Church is always the last word, but then the question arises, which is the Church? And here the Anglican High Churchmen and the Roman High Churchmen separate. In a similar manner with the Presbyterian and Independent, or still more strikingly with the Calvinist and Arminian, and even Sosinian of the Old Type, alike, the Bible is the last word. Only the Bible. But then, not to speak of the modern question, untouched by Schillingworth, what is the Bible, the further question it once arises. What is the voice of the Bible? What is true meaning? And here these several classes of Protestants separate. After having gained an apparent certainty in the assertion of a general principle, uncertainty again begins. Admitting Scripture to be the rule of faith, how are we to know the meaning of Scripture? Now it is here that Schillingworth has done real service. Here, where the real difficulty lies, he has cleared up the question, and settled it in the only way in which it can ever be consistently settled by Protestants. We will endeavor first to state his conclusions in our own language as briefly as possible, and then quote several passages from his work which set forth his views fully. of Scripture. The great principles of religion, what we are to believe concerning God and what duty God requires of us, are clearly revealed in the Bible. All Protestant churches have seen and acknowledged them. The Apostles Creed embraces them. They are patent to the right reason, the expression is his own, and judgment of every man. The matters that separate Christians, or at least Protestant Christians, are not matters of faith, necessary elements of religious truth pertaining to salvation, but matters of speculation on which Christians may differ safely or without any detriment to their spiritual condition, such as the position laid down by Schillingworth. He disposes, in short, of the question of religious certitude by reducing it to its simplest dimensions. The proper objects, the only valid objects of religious belief, according to him, are certain great facts or principles which are plainly revealed or made known to every open intelligence in Scripture. What lies beyond these facts or principles is either in its nature uncertain or in its bearing unimportant. Religious certitude, in short, can be reached by every honest mind with Scripture before it. Where such certitude is impossible, it is unnecessary. Let us now attend to Schillingworth's own statements, many of which are very significant. They are scattered over a wide surface, but we will endeavour to exhibit them in such an order as to bring out his meaning fully and yet without exaggeration. Speaking of Scripture in his second chapter as the only rule whereby to judge of controversies, he says that it is, quote, sufficiently perfect and sufficiently intelligible to all that have understanding, whether they be learned or unlearned. And my reason hereof is convincing and demonstrative, because nothing is necessary to be believed but what is plainly revealed. For to say that we're a place, by reason of ambiguous terms, lies indifferent between diver's senses, whereof one is true and the other is false, that God obliges man under pain of damnation not to mistake through error and human frailty, is to make God a tyrant. And to say that he requires us certainly to attain that end for the attaining whereof we have no certain means, which is to say that, like Pharaoh, he gives no straw and requires brick, that he reaps where he sows not, that he gathers where he strews not, that he will not accept of us according to that which we have, but requireth of us what we have not. Shall we not tremble to impute that to God which we would take as foul scorn if it were imputed to ourselves? Certainly I, for my part, fear I should not love God if I should think so strangely of him." Again he continues, addressing his opponent. When you say that unlearned and ignorant men cannot understand scripture, I would desire you to come out of the clouds and tell us what you mean. Whether that they cannot understand all scripture, or that they cannot understand any scripture, or that they cannot understand so much as is sufficient for their direction to heaven. If the first, I believe the learned, are in the same case. If the second, every man's experience will confute you, for who is there who is not capable of a sufficient understanding of the story, the precepts, the promises, and the threats of the gospel? If the third, that they may understand something but not enough for their salvation, I ask you, why then doth St. Paul say to Timothy, the scriptures are able to make him wise unto salvation? Why does St. Austin say, Why does every one of the four evangelists entitle their book THE GOSPEL, if any necessary and essential part of the gospel were left out of it? Can we imagine that either they omitted something necessary out of ignorance, not knowing it to be necessary, or knowing it to be so maliciously concealed it, or out of negligence did the work they had undertaken by halves? If none of these things can be imputed to them, then certainly it must naturally follow that every one writ the whole gospel of Christ. I mean all the essential and necessary parts of it. So that if we had no other book of scripture than one of them alone, we should not want anything necessary to salvation. Elsewhere, in a previous part of the same chapter, in reference to the statement that scripture, admitting it to be a rule or law of faith, is no more fit to end controversies without a living judge than the law is alone to end such, he answers, If the law were plain and perfect, and men honest and desirous to understand a right and obey it, he that says it were not fit to end controversies must either want understanding himself or think the world wants it. Now the scriptures we pretend in things necessary is plain and perfect. Such a law therefore cannot but be very fit to end all controversies necessary to be ended. For others that are not so, they will end when the world ends, and that is time enough." He repudiates the necessity of any judge to interpret scripture. Every man is to judge for himself with a judgment of discretion. For if the scripture, as it is in things necessary, be plain, why should it be more necessary to have a judge to interpret it in plain places than to have a judge to interpret the meaning of a counselor's decrees, and others to interpret their interpretations, and others to interpret them, and so on forever. And when they are not plain, then if we, using diligence to find the truth, do yet mis of it, and fall into error, there is no danger in it. They that err, and they that do not err, may both be saved. So that those places which contain things necessary, and where no error was dangerous, need no infallible interpreter, because they are plain. And those that are obscure need none, because they contain not things necessary. Neither is error in them dangerous. With such confidence does Chillingworth lay down the principle of the sufficiency of scripture, and of its plainness and intelligibility in all things necessary for salvation, and therefore necessary to be believed. He adverts over and over again to the great principle that the responsibility of faith is to be measured by the clearness and simplicity of the divine revelation. If God has spoken plainly, and man refused to receive the divine testimony, he has no excuse to offer for him. This were to give God the lie, he says, and questionless damnable. But as for other things, which lie without the covenant following his own expression, that is to say, which are either obscure in themselves, or capable of different interpretations, according to the variety of tempers, abilities, educations, and unavoidable prejudices whereby men's understandings are variously formed and fashioned. Quote, To say that God will damn men for errors as to such things who are lovers of him and lovers of truth, is to rob man of his comfort and God of his goodness, is to make man desperate and God a tyrant." When you can show, he adds, in the same place, in a passage of great emphasis, when you can show that God hath interposed his testimony on one side or another so that either they do see it and will not, or were it not for their own voluntary and avoidable fault, might and should see it and do not, let all such errors be as damnable as you please to make them. But if they suffer themselves neither to be betrayed into their errors, nor kept in them by any sin of their will, if they do their best endeavour to free themselves from all errors, and yet fail of it through human frailty, so well am I persuaded of the goodness of God, that if in me alone should meet a confluence of all such errors of all the protestants of the world that were thus qualified, I should not be so much afraid of them all as I should be to ask pardon for them. Close quote. Scripture on the one hand, therefore, and the free, honest, open mind, on the other hand, these are, with Chillingworth, the factors and the only factors of religious truth, the essential elements of religious certitude. Scripture is an open mirror in which every intelligence may see the truth if it only look for it. There is no necessity for any medium to transfer it or any judge to interpret it to the understanding. It lies open to all in the simple statements of the Gospels, of any one of the Gospels. It is not to be supposed that Chillingworth, in thus nakedly asserting the sufficiency of the individual judgment or reason to find the meaning of Scripture for itself, puts aside or rejects the necessity of divine influence in reaching divine truth. This special point was not in question between the two disputants. They alike recognized the reality of divine revelation and the necessity of the divine spirit. What they differed about was as to the medium of the revelation and the organ of the spirit. To the Jesuit the church was both the one and the other, the revealing medium and the interpreting spirit. Scripture was merely a help to the church. To Chillingworth, Scripture and reason were the twofold source of the truth, the one external, the other internal. We have seen sufficiently what he says as to the first. Let us observe now what he says as to the second. Nott had said that if the notion of papal infallibility were given up every man was given over to his own wit and discourse. Chillingworth replies, quote, if you mean by discourse, write reason grounded on divine revelation and common notions written by God in the hearts of all men and deducing, according to the never-failing rules of logic, consequent deductions from them. If this be it which you mean by discourse, it is very meet and reasonable and necessary that men, as in all their actions, so especially in that of greatest importance, the choice of their way to happiness, should be left unto it. And he that follows this in all his opinions and actions, and does not only seem to do so, follows always God, close quote. Again, quote, for my part I am certain that God hath given us our reason to discern between truth and falsehood, and he that makes not this use of it, but believes things he knows not why, I say that it is by chance that he believes the truth and not by choice, and that I cannot but fear that God will not accept the sacrifice of fools. But you that would not have men follow their reason, what would you have them follow? Their passions? To pluck out their eyes and go blindfold? No, you would have them follow authority. In God's name let them. We also would have them follow authority, for it is upon the authority of universal tradition that we should have them believe scripture. But then as for the authority which you would have them follow, you will let them see reason why they should follow it, and is this not to go a little about, to leave reason for a short time, and then to come to it again, and to do that which you condemn in others? It being indeed a plain improbability for any man to submit his reason but to reason." Every man, in short, must have some rational conviction at the root of his religion, however imperfect or concealed this conviction may be. He may accept his religion at first hand from the priest or the church, but he must have some reason for believing the church. He may believe that a doctrine is true because coming directly from the Spirit of God, but he must have some evidence, or in other words, some reason for believing that the doctrine does come from the divine spirit. Schillingworth is quite as much opposed to a superstitious and irrational Protestantism as to a superstitious and irrational popery. The private judgment must not merely be a particular reason that a doctrine is true, which some men pretend but cannot prove to come from the Spirit of God, but a rational judgment founded upon evidence. For is there not a manifest difference between saying, the Spirit of God tells me that this is the meaning of such a text, which no man can possibly know to be true at being a secret thing, and between saying, these and those reasons I have to show that this or that is true doctrine, or that this or that is the meaning of such a scripture, reason being a public and certain thing and exposed to all men's trial and examination?" Such is the mode in which Schillingworth settles the primary question of religious certitude, or the source of religious truth. The remaining questions scarcely admit a vital controversy after laying down such a basis. It is plain that differing here the disputants must differ throughout, as to the sum or contents of religious truth, for example, no less than its source or authority. The one question continually involves the other. Not only is the Church the authority with not, but all that the Church stamps with its authority is vital or fundamental. All is truth which the Church affirms to be true. Not at all, argues Schillingworth. That is truth only which is necessary to be believed in order to salvation. The Jesuit taunts him with the necessity of giving a catalog of necessary or fundamental doctrines. This is not at all requisite, he says. That may be fundamental and necessary to me which to another is not so. The question is one of privilege and opportunity, as the case of Cornelius shows. In his gentilism he was accepted for his present state, yet if he had continued in it and refused to believe in Christ after the sufficient revelation of the gospel to him and God's will to have him believe it, he that was accepted before would not have continued accepted. As the Romanus therefore thinks it enough to say in general that all is fundamental which the Church has defined, so it is enough for the Protestant to say in general, that it is sufficient for man's salvation to believe that the Scripture is true and contains all things necessary for salvation and to do his best endeavor to find and believe the true sense of it. The Jesuit argues that unless the Church be infallible in all things we cannot believe her in any one. Jillingworth pours great contempt upon this argument. There is no more consequence in it, he says, than in this. The devil is not infallible, therefore if he says there is one God I cannot believe him. No geometrician is infallible in all things, therefore not in these things which he demonstrates. If it be meant indeed that the Church be infallible we cannot rationally believe her simply on her own word or authority, there is no doubt of the proposition. The Church is only to be credited, everything is only credible, on fair grounds of reason and evidence presented to the crediting intelligence, that there shall be always a Church infallible in fundamentals, he admits, for this is simply to say that there shall be always a Church. But that any given Church is always an infallible guide in fundamentals is to say something quite different. This statement he entirely denies. Quote, The true Church always shall be the teacher and maintainer of all necessary truth, for it is of the essence of the Church to be so. But a man may be still a man, though he want a hand or an eye, so the Church may be still a Church, though it be defective in some profitable truth. Close quote. It follows, of course, that the simplest creed is the best creed, and that which alone offers any basis of reunion among Christians. That which is known as the Apostle's Creed best answers to this description. It has been esteemed, quote, a sufficient summary or catalog of fundamentals by the most learned Romanists and by antiquity. What man or Church, so ever, believes this creed, and all the evident consequences of it, sincerely and heartily, cannot possibly be in any error of simple belief offensive to God. Close quote. It appears to Chillingworth that it would be of the utmost advantage for the Christian world if men would recognize the adequacy of such a creed as this and hold all beyond as mere matters of speculation and opinion. There appears to him no other prospect of Christian union. For this is most certain, he says, quote, that to reduce Christians to unity of communion there are but two ways. The one by taking away the diversity of opinions touching matters of religion. The other by showing that the diversity of opinions which is among the several sects of Christians ought to be no hindrance to their unity and communion. Now the former of these is not to be hoped for without a miracle. What then remains but that the other way must be taken. And Christians must be taught to set a higher value upon those points of faith and obedience in which they agree than upon those matters of less moment wherein they differ. And understand that agreement in these ought to be more effectual to join them in one communion than their difference in other things of less moment. When I say in one communion I mean in a common profession of those articles of faith wherein all consent, a joint worship of God after such a way as all esteem lawful and a mutual performance of all those works of charity which Christians owe one to another. And to such a communion what better inducement could be thought of than to demonstrate that what was universally believed of all Christians if it were joined with a love of truth and of holy obedience was sufficient to bring men to heaven. For why should men be more rigid than God? Why should any error exclude any man from the church's communion which will not deprive him of eternal salvation? Again he says, quote, if men would allow that the way to heaven is not narrower now than Christ left it, his yoke no heavier than he made it, that the belief of no more difficulties is required now to salvation than was in the primitive church, that no error is in itself destructive and exclusive from salvation now which was not then, if instead of being zealous papists, earnest Calvinists, rigid Lutherans they would become themselves and be content that others should be plain and honest Christians. If all men would believe the scripture and freeing themselves from prejudice and passion would sincerely endeavor to find the true sense of it and live according to it and require no more of others than to do so, nor denying their communion to any that do so would so order their public service of God that all which do so may without scruple or hypocrisy or protestation against any part of it join with them in it. Who doth not see that since all necessary truths are plainly and evidently set down in scripture there would of necessity be among all men in all things necessary unity of opinion and not withstanding any other differences that are or could be unity of communion and charity and mutual toleration by which means all schism and heresy would be banished the world and those wretched contentions which now rend and tear in pieces not the coat but the members and bowels of Christ which mutual pride and tyranny and cursing and killing and damning would feign make the immortal should speedily receive a most blessed catastrophe close quote. The reader will notice the rising energy the suppressed yet hurrying vehemence which runs through this passage this is Chillingworth's manner when fully under the influence of some great thought or feeling his mind kindles and his style catches the glow and impetuosity of a noble enthusiasm there is no subject stirs him more readily or more loftily than religious liberty the thought of this liberty and how miserably men grudge it to each other and Christian churches strive to thwart and limit it instead of seeking their strength in educating it never fails to fire his language and makes it move with that grand if somewhat irregular energy which is its highest feature he acknowledges the authority of the divine word to control man's faith and no other authority proposed to me anything out of the Bible he says quote and require whether I believe it or no and seem it never so incomprehensible to human reason I will subscribe it with hand and heart as knowing no demonstration can be stronger than this God hath said so therefore it is true in other things I will take no man's liberty of judgment from him neither shall any man take mine from me I will think no man the worst man nor the worst Christian I will love no man the less for differing in opinion from me and what measure I meet to others I expect from them again I am fully assured that God does not and therefore that man ought not to require any more of any man than this to believe the scripture to be God's word to endeavor to find the true sense of it and to live according to it close quote freedom of religious opinion was thus placed by Chillingworth on its true basis more than two centuries ago six years before the Westminster Assembly met if anything were needed to show the height to which he rises above the divines of the time this simple fact is enough to show it the principle of religious latitude had indeed been already laid down by the remonstrant divines in Holland but none had seized it more clearly or boldly than Chillingworth and none had here to foregiven such systematic expression to it in England it is to be observed that he announces it as a principle for the direction and government of churches and not merely as a barren concession to the force of philosophical and religious indifference it derives all its interest to him from its connection with religious earnestness and its seeming to open up the way for the reconstitution and advancement of the Christian church the idea of religious latitude being something very good outside the church but an impossibility within it is opposed to his whole conception according to him on the contrary the only valid basis for the church the only hope of its ever becoming what it professes to be Catholic is the utmost freedom in the light of scripture whatever tends to limit or control religious faith beyond the one controlling authority of the divine word is evil this is absolute when we recognize it but whatever tends to interfere with the simplicity of this absolute spiritual authority is a source of ecclesiastical disorganization of unchristian disorder it is when he touches this strain that his language rises to indignant eloquence quote this presumptuous imposing of the senses of men upon the words of God the special senses of men upon the general words of God and laying them upon men's consciences together under the equal penalty of death and damnation this vain conceit that we can speak of the things of God better than in the words of God thus deifying our own interpretations and tyrannous enforcing them upon others this restraining of the word of God from that latitude and generality and the understandings of men from that liberty wherein Christ and the apostles left them is and hath been the only fountain of all the schisms of the church and that which makes them immortal the common incendiary of Christendom and that which tears in pieces not the coat but the bowels and members of Christ Redente Turca Nectolente Yudeo take away these walls of separation and all will quickly be won take away this persecuting burning cursing damning of men for not subscribing to the words of men as the words of God require of Christians only to believe Christ and to call no man master but him only let those leave claiming infallibility that have no title to it and let them that in their word disclaim it disclaim it likewise in their actions in a word take away tyranny which is the devil's instrument to support errors and superstitions and impiates in the several parts of the world which could not otherwise long withstand the power of truth I say take away tyranny and restore Christians to their just and full liberty of captivating their understanding to scripture only and as rivers when they have a free passage run all to the ocean so it may well be hoped by God's blessing that universal liberty thus unrestricted may quickly reduce Christendom to truth and unity close quote it is unnecessary to carry our exposition further these extracts render Chillingworth's principles sufficiently apparent they are the principles evidently neither of the Laudian school with which he was personally associated nor of the Puritan school to which he was opposed he stands aloof from both on a higher platform from the school of Laud he is separated by his elevation of scripture not only into the supreme but into the only authority in religious opinion and controversy and while the mere general assertion of this principle might seem to place him on the same level with the Puritan the manner in which he maintains and interprets the principle separates him widely from it while he recognizes the Bible as the only authority in religion he recognizes at the same time the free right of the individual reason to interpret the Bible nor does he acknowledge this merely as a generality which Puritanism may be also said to do but he accepts it as a living practical principle in all its consequences the right of free scriptural interpretation for example implies the right of religious difference beyond an obvious round of great facts and truths to be found everywhere plainly revealed in Scripture to be found complete in any one of the Gospels there is no unity of religious belief possible or desirable among Christians beyond such facts of which the Apostles Creed is the historical summary he proclaims the principle of religious latitude this is his distinction Christianity is with him belief in Christ the great facts of Christ's life and death for man's salvation without either a sacramentarian or a Calvinistic or an Armenian theory of the mode in which this salvation is made effectual to man he requires of Christians in his own language to believe only in Christ and will damn no man or doctrine without express and certain warrant from God's word he recognizes the authority of God in religion and no other this authority is addressed in Scripture to the individual reason and conscience so that the humblest intelligence may see and own it there is no second authority entitled to speak for the divine voice or to interfere between it and the individual the voice of the church the voice of creeds and of councils should be reverently listened to but they possess no binding authority in themselves over the Christian conscience insofar as they express the truth of Scripture we are to be thankful for them accept and use them but what we acknowledge in them is not the human expressions or temporary form of doctrine but the divine substance and meaning which they have sought to render quote by the religion of Protestants I do not understand the doctrine of Luther or Calvin or Melanchthon nor the confession of Augusta or Geneva nor the catechism of Heidelberg nor the articles of the church of England no nor the harmony of Protestant confessions but that wherein they all agree and which they all subscribe with a greater harmony has a perfect rule of their faith and actions that is the Bible close quote Chillingworth was thus a Protestant truly and consistently he recognized and for the first time in English theological literature fully expounded the meaning of Protestantism and its logical corollary the principle of religious latitude or of agreeing to differ in all matters of religious theory in which the varying tastes tempers and judgments of men necessarily create difference he held fast to the supremacy of Scripture the great watchword of the 16th century against Popory but he appreciated as the 16th century had not done the free action of reason upon Scripture to the cause of Protestantism and of liberal theology he has thus rendered an abiding service there are few names upon the whole even in a history so fruitful in great names as that of the church of England which more excite our admiration or which claim a higher place in the development of religious thought end of chapter five part four