I. Dr. Nicholson's Accusation of the Archbishop of Westminster

' Improbatio haereticorum facit eminere quid Ecclesia Tua sentiat, et quid habeat sana doctrina.' S. AUG. Conf. lib. vii. c. xix.

FIRST ARTICLE.

THE EASHNESS OF THE ' GUAEDIAN.'

THE Guardian is beside itself with joy in the -belief, that the Archbishop of Westminster has been trapped in a theological error condemned by an (Ecumenical Council. The Guardian has been deceived by Dr. Nicholson, an Anglican minister, who appears to be the first to rake this moon out of the pond. The Arch bishop, in preaching at the Pro- Cathedral, had stated two things: first, that the human heart of Jesus was deified by union with His Godhead; and, secondly, that it is therefore an object of divine worship. On this Mr. Nicholson, unconsciously perhaps, following the Jansenists, affirmed that by this doctrine the Archbishop introduced two adorations to the two na tures separately, and had thereby fallen under the condemnation of the Fifth (Ecumenical Council.

We would therefore propose to the Guardian and to its theologian the following question: The Sacred

Heart of Jesus, is it or is it not an object of divine worship? If the answer be, It is: then the Archbishop is justified out of the mouth of the Guardian. If the answer be, It is not: then the Guardian and its theo logy fall into the very pit which it dug for the Arch bishop of Westminster.

If the Sacred Heart of Jesus be not an object of divine worship, such divine worship can only be denied to it by asserting one or more of the following heresies:

First, that the Sacred Humanity had a human personality of its own; which is the heresy of Nestorius, condemned by this same Fifth (Ecumenical Council; or,

Secondly, that the personality of the Son is inferior to the Father, which is the heresy of Arius; or,

Thirdly, that the Sacred Heart of Jesus is not hypostatically and indissolubly united to the Person of the Eternal Word, and that it is not the Heart of the Incarnate Word in such wise as to entitle it to a communication and participation of the divine worship due to the Word as God.

Now, even if this were true, the Guardian and its teachers will not say that the Sacred Humanity is not worthy of some honour, even if inferior to divine worship, of whatsoever degree and kind it may be. And this is precisely the heresy which the Fifth Council anathematises. This is precisely the bringing in of '• two natures, to be honoured separately, with two adorations.' How was it that the Guardian, in its haste to assail a Catholic Bishop, did not at least see that it was running straight into the pit which it had been digging for the Archbishop? '

It was for this reason, that he had been so careful to affirm,

1. That the human Heart by.union with the God head of the Eternal Son was 'deified,' as S. Cyril of Alexandria teaches of the whole human nature of Christ; that is to say, it became the Heart of God.

2. That it is for ever indissolubly united with the Godhead of the Son.

3. That it therefore partakes of the divine worship due to the Divine Person whose human Heart it is.

4. That this indissoluble hypostatic union excludes the heretical notion of two natures to be separately adored with two adorations.

5. That the unity of the Person of the Incarnate Word excludes not only two adorations but any worship less than the divine.

6. That the Sacred Heart is the Heart of God, in which the uncreated and created love of God to man are indissolubly united; and that it is therefore to be adored in one act of divine worship now and to all eternity.

To put this in the simplest theological terms: First: The Humanity of Christ is to be adored by one and the same divine worship which is due to the Eternal Word with whom it is hypostatically united. This is matter of faith; and its contradictory is condemned under anathema.

Secondly: The objectum materiale of the divine worship is Christ, God and Man.

Thirdly: The object am formale or motive of the divine worship is the Divine Person of the Son.

This divine worship, one and the same, is due to Christ, God and Man: to His Godhead ' in se et propter se,' in and for itself; to His Manhood, 'in se, non tamen propter se,' in itself, but not for itself. The Sacred Humanity is to be adored with divine worship, because it is the Humanity of God, and every part of it is adorable for the same reason; therefore the Sacred Heart is an object of divine worship.

We cannot refrain from adding two observations.

The naked and explicit heresies which have been put forth on the subject of the Sacred Heart prove to demonstration a profound and heretical ignorance on the whole subject of the Incarnation. The subject of the Sacred Heart seems to have been providentially used at this time that ' the thoughts of many hearts maybe revealed.' We have been hitherto altogether unconscious, and could not have believed that so much formal Nestorianism and Semi-Arianism could lie hid in the Anglican Church. And when we remember that the Guardian is, by privilege, the paper of the Anglican clergy, and to be found in a large number of their homes, we feel a profound disappointment. We had hoped better things. We have no pleasure in the errors even of our antagonists. Hitherto we have be lieved that in the doctrines of the Holy Trinity and of the Incarnation at least the Anglican clergy were faithful and well instructed. We are much shaken in this hope by these revelations.

The other reflection is hardly less grave. Charity

' thinketh no evil' and ' rejoiceth with the truth.' We cannot understand the outburst of delighted exultation with which the Guardian published to the world that it had heard and believed that a Catholic Bishop had erred from the truth. The Guardian must hate the Catholic Church a great deal more than it loves the Christian Faith. This spirit is not of God, but of the Evil One, and is an ill omen for Anglican Christianity.

SECOND ARTICLE.

NICHOLSON V. GUIKON.

DR. NICHOLSON, having attacked the Archbishop by letter, was answered by the Kev. F. Guiron. A long correspondence followed. We know nothing like it except the Tichborne Case. If we wrong Dr. Nicholson he must thank himself for it. We know nothing of him but by his letters. If he be better than his letters we are glad of it, for his sake. Anything more shallow, pretentious, impertinent, and to all appearance insincere, we have seldom read. We will justify this severe sentence by his own words.

I. Dr. Nicholson states that he heard the Archbishop say: ' The humanity of our Blessed Eedeemer is deified in consequence of its having been assumed by the Divine Son.' This statement is perfectly Catholic and orthodox. It affirms two things, the assumption of humanity by the Son of God; and that the humanity thereby became 1 Caro Dei,' or 'Humanitas Dei;' and secondly, that the Sacred Humanity was thereby indissolubly united to the Person of the Son, and therefore ' deified.' The Archbishop states that he said: ' The Sacred Heart of our Lord, being united with the Divinity is deified, and is therefore an object of divine worship.' The terms of these propositions are different: the doctrine is the same. Both affirm the indissoluble union of humanity with the Son of God by the hypostatic union; and that the Sacred Humanity is therefore an object of divine worship. Will it be believed that upon this Dr. Nichol son founds the following charges:

1. That the Archbishop separates the Sacred Humanity from the Godhead.

2. That he teaches two adorations.

3. That he therefore falls under the anathema of the Fifth (Ecumenical Council.

It is impossible for falsification to be more direct, formal, and, we do not know how to refrain from adding, conscious. But we shall see as we go on the process of this juggle upon plain words.

II. F. Guiron, who answered Dr. Nicholson's charge, brought to his knowledge the following passage of Per-rone: ' Quamvis hsec Caro (i.e. Caro propria Verbi, or Caro Dei) adoretur in se, non adoratur tamen propter se, quod est proprium solius Dei.'

In these words Perrone affirms:

1. That divine worship is due to God alone, 'Dei solius.'

2. That both natures receive divine worship in the unity of the Person of the Word Incarnate.

3. That the Divine nature is worshipped in se et propter se, in and for itself, the- Human Nature in se but not propter se, in itself but not for itself; because it is worshipped with divine worship by reason of the Godhead of the Word, whose humanity it is.

This is a Godsend for Dr. Nicholson, who begins with new courage as follows: Perrone says that divine worship belongs to God alone, 'proprium Dei solius.' Therefore Perrone does not extend it to the human nature, 'because it is not God. With Dr. Nicholson, to affirm and to deny are one and the same thing. What he did with the Archbishop's words he now does with Perrone's. He adds, 'Perrone did not teach the deification of the Sacred Humanity.' Now it so happens that in the immediate context from which F. Guiron quoted, Perrone does teach it in the following words: * Nonnulli Patres humanum Christi velle dixere deificatum, quatenus intime conjunctum erat cum velle divino, uti ipsa humana natura cum divina.'1 But of this we hope Dr. Nicholson was in his accustomed ignorance; for if not, we must charge him not with ignorance but with something worse.

F. Guiron most truly says, Perrone did teach the deification of the Sacred Humanity, or else he could not without error have taught that the Sacred Humanity partakes of the divine worship of the Incarnate Word. This is so true that to do so would be blasphemy.

Dr. Nicholson denies that Perrone taught the deification of the Sacred Humanity. But it is undeniable that he taught that the Sacred Humanity partakes of the divine worship of the Word. Therefore, accord-

1 Tract, de Incar. pars ii. c. iii. torn. iii. 131.

ing to Dr. Nicholson, Perrone taught blasphemy. So, of course, F. Guiron, for he teaches what Perrone taught.

III. But the recoil of this on Dr. Nicholson is instant and fatal. If Perrone did not teach blasphemy, he taught that the Sacred Humanity is worshipped with divine worship, because of the hypostatic union with the Word; by which union it is ' deified.' If so, the Sacred Humanity is to be worshipped ' una adoratione,' according to the teaching of the Fifth (Ecumenical Council, quoted by Perrone in the same context,2 but Dr. Nicholson knows nothing about it; at least so we hope for the sake of his sincerity.

Here, then, we have a dilemma.

Perrone either taught that the Sacred Humanity is to be worshipped with divine worship by reason of the hypostatic union; or he did not so teach. If he did, Perrone and F. Guiron are sheltered from Dr. Nichol son, and from the anathema of the Fifth (Ecumenical Council.

If he did not so teach, then Dr. Nicholson charges not only F. Guiron and the Archbishop, but Perrone also, with introducing two adorations to two separate natures.

But Dr. Nicholson has destroyed himself; for in one of his letters he affirms that Perrone taught that the Sacred Humanity is to be adored, not because it is deified, but because it ' Verbo Divino hypostatice unita.' We will assume, then, that Dr. Nicholson admits that Perrone taught that the Sacred Humanity partakes of divine worship by reason of the hypostatic union. But

2 Pars ii. c. iv. torn. iii. 141.

why not say so? Because, we fear, Dr. Nicholson began to have a nervous instinct that if he were to say so, his whole case would be ruined. As we shall next show.

IV. F. Guiron very truly says, in perfect conformity with the fathers and theologians of the Church, that the word ' deify' ordinarily signifies ' to be exalted to an object of worship.' Now nothing can be worshipped with divine worship but God alone — ' est Dei solius,' as Dr. Nicholson learns from Perrone. Therefore nothing which is separate from God, or out of God, can be an object of divine worship. But the Sacred Humanity, which by hypostatic union was assumed by the Eternal Word, is made ' Caro Dei,' and therefore eo ipso deified. Dr. Nicholson calls the hypostatic union a ' possessive relation:' of which more before we have done. We affirm that the ' Caro Dei,' hypostatically, indissolubly, and eternally united to the Son, partakes of the divine worship due to His Godhead alone in se, et propter se, because TOTUS CHRISTUS, Deus et Homo, is worshipped una eademque divini cultus adoratione. Iniquitas mentita est sibi, which may be rendered, Ill-will is caught in its own trap.

Dr. Nicholson's affirmation that Perrone taught that the Sacred Humanity partakes of divine worship because it is hypostatically united to the Divine Word, proves also that Perrone held that the Sacred Humanity was elevated by assumption to be ' Caro Dei,' or deified. But these are the ipsissima verla of F. Guiron; there fore Perrone and F. Guiron alike teach the same Catholic doctrine of the deification and divine worship of the Humanity of the Incarnate Word; or they are alike blasphemous. But Dr. Nicholson either does not see what he is saying, which is a crime in an accuser, or he sees and knows that his accusation is false. We leave him to take his choice.

Y. We will now go one step onward into Dr. Nicholson's labyrinth, or, as Lord Bacon would call it, his ' maze.' Kising to the occasion, he finally delivers himself of the following sentence: ' The Chief Pastor of the Roman Church in England, from the principal pulpit of his charge, delivers himself dogmatically of a heresy which has been condemned under Catholic anathema.'

If this means anything it means:

1. That the Archbishop taught that the two natures in Christ are to be adored separately.

2. That these two adorations are not one and the same. For if they were one and the same they could not be two.

But we have no need to argue and deduce. Dr. Nicholson has asserted all this in words. He writes: ' Compare with this the dogmatic statement of Arch bishop Manning conveyed in your letter:

' " The Divine Person is adored and the Humanity which He assumed is adored.

' " The two natures of Christ are both the objects of divine worship, but in a different degree.":

We hope to prove that Dr. Nicholson has deliberately falsified the Archbishop's words, and foisted in his own. There is not a syllable of the Archbishop's or of F. Guiron's, as we shall show, even susceptible of this perversion. It is a pure, gratuitous, and very culpable imputation. This we shall show in due time.

Now we have Dr. Nicholson's report of the Arch bishop's words before us. ' The human nature of the Blessed Kedeemer is deified in consequence of its having been assumed by the Divine Son.' The Archbishop was speaking of the divine worship of the Sacred Heart, and only incidentally of the doctrine of the Sacred Humanity as a whole. He therefore restated his words as follows: ' The Sacred Heart of our Lord, being united with the Divinity, was deified, and there fore an object of divine worship.' What is true of the Sacred Humanity as a whole is true of every part of the same. Now the word ' hypostatically' is indeed not used here, because few who hear a preacher understand the terminology of the schools. But both these formulse contain and fully enunciate the hypostatic union as the motive of the divine worship of which the Sacred Humanity partakes.

By ' assumed ly the Divine Son,' as in the first formula, or by ' united with the Divinity' of our Lord, as in the second, the hypostatic union is completely enun ciated. The human nature is thereby declared to be ' Caro Dei:' therefore eo ipso it was deified, and there fore it partakes in the divine worship due to the Eternal Word. Deification and divine worship are inseparable from the hypostatic union.

Where, then, are the ' two natures to be worshipped separately' and the ' two adorations' condemned by the Fifth (Ecumenical Council? There is not a shadow of two adorations in either the Archbishop's or F. Guiron's words. It is Dr. Nicholson who, by the juggle on Perrone's words ' Dei solius' has foisted in the notion of separation; and then argues thus: The Archbishop says the Sacred Humanity is to be worshipped. But Perrone says divine worship belongs to God alone, therefore the Sacred Humanity is not to be worshipped with divine worship. And this with the word ' deified' before him. But F. Guiron asserts, as Dr. Nicholson says, ' the two natures of Christ are both the objects of divine worship, but in a different degree.' Dr. Nichol son repeats the words and changes object into objects, and on his own falsification founds a charge of two separate adorations. F. Guiron expressly says that Christ is the objectum, one and indivisible. His meaning by ' degree' is that the Divine nature is worshipped for its own sake, the Human is not. The worship is one and the same. If he had said, ' With this difference' he would have more effectually shut out Dr. Nicholson's cavils. Therefore the heresies condemned by the Fifth Council are taught, not by the Archbishop, not by F. Guiron, not by Perrone, but profoundly and explicitly by Dr. Nicholson, unless in dissimulation he be prevaricating like the Pharisees when they answered the dilemma of our Lord as to the Baptism of John: ' If we shall say from heaven, He will say to us: Why, then, did you not believe him? but if we shall say from men, we are afraid of the multitude, for all held John as a prophet.'

VI. We will now proceed to deal with Dr. Nichol son's own theology. If it be as he states, it is ' bad enough. If it be better than his statements, so much the worse for him, for then we cannot clear him of dissimulation. But we reserve our estimate of Dr. Nichol son's conduct as he has exhibited himself to us for the end. Now for his theology. If Dr. Nicholson's notion of ' deification' can be ascertained from his words at all, it would seem to be this, that the human nature ceased to be created and finite, and became infinite and uncreated: that is to say, it ceased to be Human nature and became Divine nature. This is portentous: but unless Dr. Nicholson means this, we can in no way discover what he means. He says in one place, (No one denies that the Divine Word holds a possessive relation in respect to Caro: what the precise modus of that possession is, the Catholic faith defines in the doc trine of the hypostatic union.' We will hope that Dr. Nicholson does not mean the Nestorian ' habitudo (Tfcsrizr].' Well, what is the hypostatic union? Dr. Nicholson does not tell us. He could not do so without saying that it is ' the assumption of Humanity by the Son or by the Eternal Word into the unity of His Divine Person.' But if he had said this, he would have repeated the Archbishop's and F. Guiron's statements, and destroyed his own.

VII. He then quotes as applicable to the pending question the words of S. Proclus in the Council of Ephesus, ' neque hominem deificatum prsedicamus, sed Deum incarnatum confitemur;' that is, ' we do not preach a Deified Man, but the Incarnate God.' What has this ostentatious parade to do with the question? But we will leave this point for a future article-. The Exucontians and Nestorians, indeed, taught that Jesus had a created and human personality, and, in condemning them, the Council of Ephesus gave to Mary the title of ' Mother of God.' This title is a test of faith in the sole and divine personality of Jesus. Will Dr. Nicholson call her Mother of God? If so, he will then understand S. Proclus: and not hefore. But this is, we trust, simple blundering. We go on to something worse. Dr. Nicholson proceeds to quote the following passages to prove that divine worship is not to he given to the Sacred Humanity of Christ. Theologians, says Bellarmine, attribute hyperdulia ' Soli Humanitati Christ! et Matri ejus.' He next quotes Dens as saying ' Humanitas Christi concepta per mentem ut separates, Persona Verhi non sit colenda cultu latrise sed hyperdulise.'

And yet with this hefore him, with ' soli,' and 'separata,' and 'per mentem concepta,' Dr. Nicholson is either incapable of seeing, or unwilling to see, that both Bellarmine and Dens, as S. Thomas did before them, are contemplating, not the question of the Adoration of the Sacred Humanity ' assumed ' by, or ' united ' to, the Person of the Son, with which the Archbishop and F. Guiron are all through and exclusively occupied, but in se, and as mentally separated from the Person of the Eternal Word. If Dr. Nichol son will take the trouble to read what S. Thomas says in P. iii. Qucest. XXV. articles 1 and 2, of which we hope he was ignorant, he will see that it has nothing to do with the question.

The Archbishop and F. Guiron, Perrone and FranzQlin, with every Catholic theologian, affirm that the Sacred Humanity of Christ is deified by assumption and by union with the Person of the Divine Word. And yet Dr. Nicholson has, we must say, the effrontery to write as follows: ' Archbishop Manning abstracts the Humanity and separates the human Heart per se of the Blessed Kedeemer as the objectum materiale of divine worship.'

This is precisely what the Archbishop and F. Guiron exclude and render impossible for any truthful mind to imagine.

Their position all along is that the human Heart is the Sacred Heart, and it is sacred because of the hypostatic union, by which it is deified and is indivisibly united to the Person of the Incarnate Word, who is, both as God and Man, the objectum materiale of divine worship.

VIII. Further, to draw the accusation closer around the Archbishop, Dr. Nicholson quotes the ninth canon of the Fifth Council. He gives it as follows: ' Si quis in duabus naturis adorari dicit Christum ' (which Archbishop Manning does say), &c. We hope the Archbishop does say so, for it is the Catholic faith, without which no man can be saved. Indeed the same canon of the same Council says so. It declares that Christ is to be adored und adoratione; ' Deum Verbum Incarnatum cum proprid ipsius carne,' that is to say, He is to be adored in two natures with one adoration,. namely, with divine worship. Dr. Nicholson does not perceive that the point of the Canon is in the words which follow: ' ex quo duas adorationes introducunt.' If we understand him, Dr. Nicholson explicitly does VOL. n. c this, for lie restricts latria ' Deo Soli/ and gives hyperdulia ' soli Humanitati Christ!.'

Dr. Nicholson is therefore by his own confession pointedly under the anathema of the Fifth (Ecumenical Council, and there, as a theologian of immense pretence and of equal incapacity, for the present we leave him.

We will next deal with Dr. Nicholson's assertion that the Koman Church < distinctly teaches that the Humanity of Christ is not an object of latria.'

THIRD ARTICLE.

IS THE SACKED HUMANITY TO BE WORSHIPPED WITH LATBIA?

It is impossible to guess what Dr. Nicholson does believe as to the doctrine of the Incarnation; but he has at length committed himself to a statement of what he does not believe. Here, then, we have some thing positive; and with this we can deal.

He says the Roman Church 'distinctly teaches that the Humanity of Christ is not (sic) an object of latria.'

We will therefore prove that the Koman Church does distinctly teach that the Humanity of Christ is an object of latria. To preclude all misunderstanding or cavil we will begin by the following assertions:

1. That the Humanity of Christ was so assumed by the Eternal Word that it never for a moment of time existed apart from the Person of the Son.

2. That the Humanity so assumed by hypostatic union is indissolubly united to the Person of the Son.

The supposition that it ever in reality existed apart from the Person of the Son is Nestorianism.

The supposition that it can or ever will exist apart from the Person of the Son is a heresy without a name.

S. John makes such heresies the sign of Anti christ: ' Every spirit that dissolveth Jesus is not of God; and this is Antichrist.'3

The Sacred Humanity is the Humanity of Christ * in concrete.'

To abstract it ' per mentis conceptionem ' is to create a mental idea which has not, never had, and never can have a real existence.

The Humanity, therefore, of which the Archbishop spoke, and of which we treat, is the Sacred Humanity as it exists by hypostatic union in the Incarnate Word at the right hand of God, and in the Blessed Sacrament.

Before we prove this point it will be well to point out a mishap which has befallen Dr. Nicholson. He was evidently not aware that there are among scholastic theologians two questions bearing on the Adoration due to the Sacred Humanity perfectly distinct from each other.

1. The one is, What adoration or cultus is due to the Sacred Humanity in concrete, that is as subsist ing in the Person of the Incarnate Word. 3 1 S. John iv. 3.

2. The other is, What adoration or cultus is due to the Humanity of our Lord in abstracto, that is 'per mentem concepta tanquam separata a Persona Verbi;' or, as they say, ' prsecisione facta ab unione hypostatica.'

The former of these two questions is resolved by every Catholic authority, by fathers, councils, school men, and theologians, in one and the same sentence: namely, that the Sacred Humanity in concreto—tln&t is, as subsisting by hypostatic union in the Person of Christ— is to be worshipped with one and the same adoration; namely, with Latria. This was the affirmation of the Archbishop and of F. Guiron, and with this solely and exclusively they had to do.

' The other scholastic question was brought in by Dr. Nicholson, and imputed without shadow of reason to the Archbishop. And it is evident that he picked up this notion out of Dens, altogether misunderstanding its meaning. At page 39, vol. v. De Incarnatione (Dublin, 1832), Dens says that the Humanity of Christ, ' concepta per mentem ut separata a Persona Verbi' is to be adored, not with latria, but with hyperdulia.

Now this question is both treated and resolved by a line of scholastics and theologians from S. Thomas downwards. All who have commented on the twenty-fifth Question of the Third Part of S. Thomas have more or less treated of it.

But Dr. Nicholson did not know, at least so we hope, that this question has nothing whatever to do with the Adoration of the Sacred Humanity as subsisting in the Incarnate Word. And this alone is the Adoration of the Sacred Heart.

The meaning of this scholastic question as to the Humanity in abstracto is as follows: Treating of the cultus due to persons or objects separate from the Divine Nature, theologians say: The Humanity of Christ is the most perfect Humanity in and by itself. It was conceived of the Holy Ghost. It was born of the Virgin Mary, who by special privilege was exempt from original sin. It was, in its origin and in its perfections natural and supernatural, of a greater excellence than the Humanity of His Blessed Mother, who, though without stain of original sin, was born in the order of nature. It is more excellent than the Humanity of the first Adam made of the earth, and is therefore of the highest excellence among the works of God; and, as such, is an object of veneration or cultus proportioned to that excellence. Now its excellence transcends that of all Saints, and it is therefore to be worshipped with hyperdulia.

Bellarmine holds this opinion. Suarez maintains the same. Vasquez maintains that it is impossible to conceive the thought, and that if it were possible, it is not right to do so. De Lugo holds the balance between them, agreeing partially with both, but treats the question as a pure speculation. Nobody ever dreamed of bringing S. Thomas and all the Scholastics under the anathema of the Fifth (Ecumenical Council, which condemns two adorations to the two natures God and Man separately in Christ. The question is one of mere intellectual abstraction. All alike affirm, as a matter of faith, that the Sacred Humanity in concrete, that is, as subsisting in the Incarnate Word, is to be adored una eacUmque Divini Cultus adoratione.

But Dr. Nicholson, it appears, knows nothing of this scholastic question, and in his haste to accuse Archbishops and priests has fallen into his own snare. He denies that the Sacred Humanity as it subsists in the Incarnate Word is an object of latria.

He thus falls directly under the anathema condemning two adorations, because he thereby separates the natures in Christ.

We say we hope he was ignorant, though such ignorance in an accuser is very culpable. And yet we do not know how to believe that he could be ignorant of it, for in the paragraph immediately going be fore his quotation, Dens says: ' Q. Quo cultu adoratur

Christus Homo? E. Cultu Latrice Adoratur enim Humanitas ut subsistens in Verbo.'

We will now give the evidence to show that the Catholic Church distinctly teaches, and has always distinctly taught, that the Sacred Humanity, as sub sisting in the Incarnate Word, is an object of latria.

We will proceed to prove this as follows:

I. First by Scripture. The three following pass ages have been from the earliest ages quoted to prove that the Humanity of Christ is an object of latria:

1. • When He bringeth in the first-begotten into the world He saith: And let all the angels of God adore Him ' — that is, the Incarnate Son.4

2. ' For which cause God also hath exalted Him,

4 Heb. i. 6.

and hath given Him a name which is ahove all names: that at the Name of Jesus every knee shall bow, of those that are in heaven, on earth, and under the earth: and that every tongue shall confess that.the Lord Jesus Christ is in the glory of God the Father ' — that is Jesus, God and Man.0

Now in both these texts the object of divine worship in heaven and earth, that is of angels and men, is Christ, God and Man.

But to preclude cavil we add a third text:

3. ' Adore the footstool of His feet, for it is holy.'6 S. Ambrose, S. Augustin, and others quote these words, and explain them thus: ' Itaque per scabellum terra intelligitur: per terram autem Caro Christi, quam hodie quoque in mysterio adoramus, et quam Apostoli in Domino Jesu, ut supra diximus, adorarunt; neque enim divisus est Christus, sed unus.'7 ' There fore by the word footstool the earth is to be under stood, and by the earth the Flesh of Christ, which to-day also we adore in a mystery, and which the Apostles worshipped in the Lord Jesus as we before said. For Christ is not divided, but is one.'

In like manner S. Augustin: ' Suscepit enim de terra terram, quia caro de terra est: et de carne Marias carnem accepit... nemo autem illam carnem man-ducat nisi prius adoraverit, inventum est quemadmo-

5 Phil. ii. 9-11. 6 Ps. xcviii. 5.

7 S. Ambros. De Spiritu Sancto, lib. iii. 79. For greater convenience, we refer to the reprint of the Dogmata Theologica of Thomassinus (Vives, Paris, 1872) for this and the following quota tions. See De Incarnatione, lib. xi, torn. iv. p. 500.

dum adoretur tale scabellum pedum Domini, et non soluni non peccamus adorando, sed peccamus non adorando.'8 ' For He took earth from the earth, because flesh is of earth, and He received flesh from the flesh of Mary... but no one eats that flesh except he has first adored it, and so we have shown how such a footstool of the Lord's feet is adored, and not only do we not sin in adoring it, but we sin in not ador ing it.'

These quotations serve two purposes. They prove that latria is due to the Sacred Humanity, and to Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament; but we confine ourselves to our thesis.

II. Secondly, the same is proved by tradition, of which the following passages are sufficient evidence. S. Athanasius writes: ' We do not adore a creature, God forbid. Such madness belongs to heathens and to Arians. But we adore the Lord of things created, the Incarnate Word of God. For though the flesh itself, by itself, be a part of things created, yet it is made the body of God. Neither do we adore His body divided and apart from the Word; nor when we adore the Word do we separate the Word from the flesh: for inasmuch as we know that the Word was made flesh, we acknowledge God the Word dwelling in the flesh.'9

S. John Damascene says: ' Christ therefore is one, perfect God and perfect Man, whom we adore

8 S. August. Enarr. in Ps. xcviii. 9.

9 S. Athan. Epist. ad Adelphium, sect. 3.

with the Father and the Holy Ghost in one adoration, with His immaculate flesh.'10

So also S. Ildephonsus of Toledo: ' As to which mystery, Cyril, answering Nestorius, declares Christ to he so one, that is G-od and Man; not as if we adore a man with the Word, lest hy this a certain division he introduced; but adoring one and the same (object) in the unity of the Person: for the body (of the Word) is not apart from the Word; nor diverse, because the Word was made flesh; and Manhood is • so united and assumed into God as to be one God.'11

We have already given the evidence of S. Ambrose and S. Augustin. If we were writing a book instead of an article, we could add proofs from S. Jerome, S. Cyril, S. Epiphanius, and many more, but we refer the reader to the Dogmata Theologica of Thomassinus, De Incarnatione Verbi Dei, lib. xi. c. ii. torn. iv. p. 499, in which he profusely proves from the Fathers the following proposition: 'That the Word made Flesh is worshipped with the one Adoration of latria; and that thus the Humanity also • is encompassed in the worship of latria.'

III. The same doctrine is taught by Petavius, De Incarnatione Verbi, lib. xv. c. iii. His thesis is that Christ, God and Man, is to be adored with one adoration. This he proves by the same texts of Holy Scripture quoted above, and by the same and other Fathers, and by the Decrees of Councils. We have

10 S. John Damas. De Fide Orthodoxa.

11 S. Ildeph. Fragm. de Partu Virginis.

sufficiently given the two first classes of evidence and will give only the last.

The Synod of Alexandria under S. Cyril addressed to Nestorius a Synodal Epistle with twelve anathematisms. Nestorius was required under anathema to subscribe to the following Canon: ' If any one shall dare to say that the Humanity assumed is to be adored together with God the Word and to be glorified together with Him, as one thing with another (i.e. as two things), and not that Emmanuel should rather be adored with one adoration,... let him be anathema.'

This Epistle and the anathematisms were inserted in the Definition of Faith by the Council of Chalcedon. The Fifth (Ecumenical Council also confirmed the same by a new, that is, its ninth Canon. So also the Lateran Council, under Martin I., confirmed all these previous acts. It gives the ninth Canon of the Fifth Council as follows: ' If any man shall say that Christ is to be adored in two natures, by which they bring in two adorations, to God the Word separately and to the Humanity • separately; or if any man so adore Christ, affirming the nature or essence of the two that are united to be one, so as to destroy the flesh or to confound the Godhead and the Manhood; and shall not adore with one adoration God the Word Incarnate with His flesh according to the tradition of the Church of God from the beginning, let him be anathema.' On this Petavius continues: 'Hence it is evident from the consent and tradition of the Church as a fixed and established truth, that the flesh or the Human Nature of the Word is to be worshipped with one only, and that the divine and supreme adoration.'12 He proves the same also in lib. vi. c. xvi.

IV. It can hardly be necessary to proceed further; and yet it may be well to show the rigorous precision with which the Catholic Church teaches by all its authorities that the Sacred Humanity is to be adored with the worship of latria.

We will begin, then, with the Scholastics; and we will take one who may stand for all, though it would be easy to multiply authorities without number. S. Thomas, p. iii. art. xxv. a. 1, proposes the following thesis: ' Utrum una et eadem adoratione sit adoranda Divinitas Christi e't ejus Humanitas?' He answers, quoting the same Epistle and anathematisms of S. Cyril, that Christ, God and Man, is to be adored with one and the same adoration. He next asks (2), 'Utrum Humanitas Christi adoranda sit adoratione latriae?' He answers affimatively, < the adoration of the Humanity is the adoration of latria.' The whole school of SummistaB, that is those who have expounded the Summa of S. Thomas, repeat the same doctrine.

V. We will, however, add certain more recent theologians. Dr. Nicholson does not know what weight is to be given to Perrone or to Franzelin. We do not know what weight he may ascribe to Tournely, or whether he has ever heard of him. We select Tournely because of his great and widespread and mature authority as a Catholic theologian re presenting the theology of the Church of France. In

12 Petavius, De Incarnatione, lib. xv. c. iii. 6.

his chapter headed, * De Adoratione Christi Hominis,' he begins at once by affirming ' Humana Christi natura hypostatice Yerbo conjuncta, eadem et unica cum Divinitate Verbi adoratione colenda est:' that is 'the Human Nature of Christ hypostatically joined to the Word is to be worshipped with one and the same adoration as the Divine Word.' This he proves by the same Scriptures and Fathers adduced above. He then adds what Dr. Nicholson will do well to weigh: ' Atqui hinc facilis est solutio communis ac trita3 hujus objectionis: soli Deo latrise cultus debetur; humanitas vero Christi Deus non est; ergo Latriaa cultus illi non debetur. Distinguenda minor propositio: Humanitas seu homo non est Deus, separatus et sejunctus a Verbo, concedo; hypostatice unitus cum Verbo, nego.' ' Hence we may easily solve the following common and trite objection: viz. the worship of latria is due to God alone; the Humanity of Christ is not God; therefore the worship of latria is not due to it. We must distinguish the minor proposition: the Humanity is not God separated and apart from the Word: granted; but hypostatically united with the Word, I deny it,' i.e. it is God.

We shall return upon this, when we speak hereafter of the Deification of the Humanity of the Word. We must not be deterred by Dr. Nicholson's want of appreciation of Perrone and Franzelin from giving their evidence.

Perrone places at the head of the chapter distorted by Dr. Nicholson, who did not even know Perrone by name, the following thesis: ' The Human Nature of

Christ is to be adored with one and the same worship of latria in the Divine Word, with whom it is hypostatically united.' He adds, ' De fide est propositio, cujus contradictoria proscripta est in Concilio Gen. V., Con. IV.'13

Franzelin says, ' Christ is to be adored, both re garded as to His Divine Nature, and regarded as to His Human Nature, with one and the same supreme worship of latria.'14

We give only one more quotation, because it will represent the whole Society of Jesus in its theological tradition. In the Theologia Wirceburgensis15 we read, ' Quseritur nuiic: utrum Christus, non qua Deus tan-turn, ut per se patet, sed et qua homo, religionis cultu adorari debeat? Dico. Christus homo, in utraque natura, divina et humana subsistens, hoc est homo Deus, sive humana Christi natura verbo hypostatice conjuncta, uno eodemque latriae actu absolute adorari debet quo Verbi Divinitas.'

Question. Is Christ to be worshipped with religious worship, not only as God, which is self-evident, but also as Man?

Answer. ' Christ as Man, subsisting in both divine and human nature, that is the Man-God, or the human nature of Christ hypostatically united to the Word, is to be worshipped absolutely with one and the same act of latria as the Divine Word.'

From all these proofs it is evident that the Catholic

13 De Incarn. p. ii. c. iv. art. ii.

14 De Verio Incarn. p. 458, cap. vi. th. xlv.

15 P. ii. De Incarnatione, diss. v. sect. iii. art. 1.

Church teaches as a doctrine revealed by God and defined by the Church ' that the Humanity of Christ is an object of latria.' This is de fide; and to be held as of divine and Catholic faith.

Dr. Nicholson's assertion therefore that the Roman Church ' distinctly teaches that the Humanity of Christ is not (sic) an object of latria,' is heretical. A material heretic he certainly is; a formal heretic, ' sciens et prudens,' we hope he may not be, because the abundant proof he has given of ignorance, culpable as it is, de monstrates that he does not know what he is saying.

FOURTH ARTICLE.

THE DEIFICATION OF THE SACRED HUMANITY.

DR. NICHOLSON affirms that ' Perrone does not teach the deification of the Sacred Humanity.' This proposition must also mean that the Catholic Church does not teach that doctrine; for he does not surely intend, that Perrone does not teach it, but that the Church does. This would destroy his own argument and prove F. Guiron's. We therefore assume that Dr. Nicholson means that the Roman Church, as he calls it, does not teach the Deification of the Sacred Humanity.

"We shall now go on to prove that the Catholic Church does teach the Deification of the Sacred Humanity: and in doing so we shall show what is the true meaning of this mode of speech. «

We will begin by affirming that the ' assumptio humanitatis in Deum,' or ' the assumption of manhood into God/ and the ' deificatio humanitatis/ or 'the making of humanity to he God's humanity/ are in effect one and the same thing. Whatever distinction of thought can he conceived, the action and the effect are identical.

We will first give evidence from the Fathers, secondly from the scholastic theology, and lastly from theologians of unquestioned authority.

And first for the evidence of the Fathers.

The fourth book of Petavius's great work on the Incarnation is amply sufficient to prove our assertion. He begins thus: ' Of the two natures which subsist in the one Person of Christ, it has been thus far shown that one of them, namely the Divine, has been made incarnate: that is, the Word Himself was made flesh and man. Now, on the other hand, we must inquire whether it ought to be said that man has been made God.'

S. Gregory of Nazianzum writes: ' What greater thing could befall the humility of manhood than that it should be joined to God, and from that union become God?' And again: ' For both these natures by union are one (suppositum), God indeed made man. and man deified.'

' For when/ as he says, 'the humanity assumed by the Word is said QtovaQou, it is the same as to be and to be called God.'

In another place S. Gregory says, ' God was mani fest with that which He assumed, One in two natures opposed to each other, flesh and spirit: one of which deified, the other was deified.' And again, ' That which deifies and that which is deified is one God.'

S. John Damascene also writes as follows: ' The Word Himself was made flesh, conceived of a Virgin and manifested to be God with the nature He assumed, which was already deified by Him in the moment when it began to exist.- So that there were three things simultaneous: Assumption, Existence, Deification.' He then calls the Blessed Virgin Mother of God, ' propter deificationem humanitatis.'

Euthymius in like manner speaks of 'Deus inhumatus,' and ' homo deificatus,' and of ' inhumatio' and * deificatio;' and finally says, ' That which was assumed, by the fact of union, was deified.'

S. Augustin says, ' Such was that assumption which made God man, and man God.'

In the Lateran Council against the Monothelites, Maximus of Aquileia declared the 'human will to be deified.'

After many other quotations from the Fathers, Petavius adds, 'Atqui hominem assumi a Deo, nihil aliud est quam fieri Deum.' ' But, that Humanity is assumed by God is nothing else but that it is deified.'16 Though these proofs are enough, we will yet add one or two more because of their special clearness and weight.

S. Athanasius says, ' God Himself was made Flesh, that His Flesh might be made God the Word,'17

' Therefore He assumed a human and ingenerate

16 1 Petav. De Incarn. lib. iv. ix. 5, 1-5.

17 Lib. de Human. Natura Suscepta, sect. 3, torn. ii. p. 873, ed.Ben.

body that, having renewed it as its maker, He might make it God,' i.e. ' deify it.'18

' Though the Flesh regarded in itself he a part of things created, yet it has been made the Body of God.'19

' He deified that which He put on.'20 ' The Lord when made man for us, and bearing a body, was no less God,... but (He) rather deified it.'21

'For He received it as far as man's nature was exalted; which exaltation was its being deified.'22

' Being God, He has taken to Him the flesh; and, being in the flesh, makes the flesh God, Qeovrdtsi; i.e. He deifies it.'28

S. Cyril of Alexandria says: ' We never say that the flesh of the Word was made divinity, but divine, forasmuch as it was His own (flesh). For if the flesh of man is called human, what hinders our calling that (flesh) divine which is the flesh of God the Word? Why, then, mock and revile the apotheosis of that holy flesh which we rightly understand to be deification?'

We will add only one more passage: ' Therefore we assert the Body of Christ to be divine; since it is the Body of God, adorned with ineffable glory, incorruptible, holy, life-giving; but that it has been changed into the

18 Orat. II. contra Arianos, 70, torn. ii. p. 537.

15 Ep. ad Adelphium, sect. 3; S. Ath. Opp. torn. ii. p. 912.

20 Orat. contra Arianos, i. sect. 7.

21 Ep. in Defence of the Nicene Creed, sect. 3.

22 Orat. I. contra Arianos, sect. 45.

23 Orat III. contra Arianos, sect. 38. See also Petav. de Incarn. lib. iv. cap. ix. sect. 1, and lib. ix.

VOL. II. D nature of deity neither any of the Holy Fathers either thought or said; nor do we so think.'24

So much for the evidence of the Fathers. Next for the scholastic theology; hut that we may not overload a mere article we will confine ourselves to S. Thomas alone. He says in Part III. q. ii. art. 1:

' As S. John Damascene says, " The Divine Nature is said to he incarnate because it is personally (hypo-statice) united to the flesh, not that it is converted into flesh. In like manner the flesh is said to be deified (as he also says), not by conversion, but by union with the Word, without change in its natural properties; so that the flesh is understood to be deified because it is made the flesh of God the Word, not because it is made (to be) God." '

Also in q. xvi. art. 3, S. Thomas says:

'And in this manner the human nature is not called essentially God (Deus), but deified; not indeed by conversion of it into the divine nature, but by union with the divine nature in one Person, as is evident from Damascene.'25

And again, q. xvi. art. 5, S. Thomas says: ' Both natures in Christ are united to each other in the Per son, by reason of which union the divine nature is said to be incarnate, and the human nature to be deified.'

This same tradition of doctrine and of terminology runs through the schoolmen and the theologians of the Church. We will pass over Bellarmine, Vasquez, Petavius, and Thomassinus, who all use it, and give only

24 Apud Franzelin, pp. 319, 321.

» De Fide Orthod. lib. iii. cap. xi. xiii.

two examples, which will be abundant, and then sum up the evidence.

De Lugo, whose name alone will suffice for all who know what theology is, writes as follows:

' Though,' he says, « the Deity be not united immediately with the humanity, but only mediately (i.e. mediante Persona), yet this is enough, that it should truly deify the humanity. For the Deity alone, and not the Personality, is (forma, deificans) that which deifies the humanity.'26

' The Deity is the same in the Father and the Son: yet it is not the Father that formally deifies or sanctifies the humanity, but the Son; because the Deity as it is in the Son, and not as it is in the Father, has the condition necessary for that effect, that is to say, the sub- • sistence (hyposta-sis) of the Son, by means of which it is united to the humanity.'27

De Lugo continues: ' The Personality is not (forma deificans) that which deifies, nevertheless the Deity formally deifies the humanity by means of the Personality (mediante personalitate); not that this is that which deifies, but because it is the condition necessary to this effect, namely, that the Deity may deify (the humanity).'28 The Humanity subsisting in the hypostatic union, i.e. with the Person, is therefore eo ipso deified, but it is deified by union with the Divine Nature.

In treating of the abstract question discussed by Suarez and Vasquez as to the adoration of the Humanity per mentem concepta tanquam separata, De Lugo se De Incarn. disp. xvi. sect. 1, 39. 2" Ibid. 28 Ibid. 48.

uses throughout the word 'deified' as the recognised terminology.

He says that the Humanity of Christ has not its sanctity from itself, but partakes of the sanctity of God: ' Sicut enim participat deificationern, sic etiam participat sanctificationem.'29

Suarez had said that the Humanity may be adored for the excellence of the union which it has with the Word, without at the same time adoring the Word also. De Lugo answers, ' You will say with Vasquez that the Humanity cannot be adored, as united with the Word, without adoring the Word, because the Humanity as it is united is the Humanity deified, and the Humanity deified includes the Deity itself.'30

We will add one quotation from the Sixth (Ecumenical Council: ' As His most holy.spotless animate flesh (i.e. flesh with the soul) was not destroyed by being deified, but remained in its own state and nature, so also His human will being deified was not destroyed.' This use, then, of the term. ' deify1 is consecrated in a definition of faith by an (Ecumenical Council. We may now sum up this part of the subject. The Humanity assumed into God is not united immediately with the Divine Nature, for the Divine Nature is common to the Three Persons of the Ever-Blessed Trinity; but the Son alone is Incarnate. Nevertheless the action whereby the Incarnation was accomplished, being an action of God ad extra, was an action of the Three Persons of the Ever-Blessed Trinity.

29 De Incarn. disp. xvi. sect. iii. 56.

30 Ibid. disp. xxxv. sect. ii. 40.

But the Son alone assumed our humanity in the unity of His Person, and by this hypostatic act it became the Humanity of the Eternal Son; so that S. Cyril says, ' As we have each one our own body, so in like manner the body of the Only Begotten was His own and not another's.'31 So the Sixth Council teaches: ' His flesh is called and is the flesh of God the Word.'

But the Humanity which is united immediately with the Person of the Son is united in the Person of the Son with the Divine Nature; and is thereby deified. 'Nam propria ipsius erat ilia Caro.' It was therefore ' Caro facta Dei.' S. Thomas writes, ' The union of human nature with the Word of God is made in the Person, not in the Nature;'32 that is, as Kusticus says, ' Non Deus Verbum per Divinam Naturam, sed Divina Natura per Dei Verbi Personam unita dicitur carne.'33

Franzelin says, ' In the human nature Incarnation is the being so united that the humanity subsists not in itself, but as a nature of the Word in the Word; and this is properly that which the Fathers call the Deification of the Human Nature.'34

It may not be amiss to restate here the propositions which gave rise to the correspondence of Dr. Nicholson and F. Guiron.

The Archbishop of Westminster had said, according to Dr. Nicholson, that 'the Humanity of our Blessed Redeemer is deified in consequence of its having been assumed by the Divine Son.'

31 Franzelin, De Verio Incarn. p. 287.

32 S. Thorn, p. iii. sect. 2, art. 2.

33 Franzelin, p. 288. 34 u,^ pt 290.

That is to say: The Sacred Humanity being united immediately with the Person of the Divine Son, and in His Person with the Divine Nature, it was thereby, i.e. by that union, deified.

This proposition is to the letter Catholic and precise; and in the very terms of the Councils, Fathers, and Theologians of the Catholic Church. The Arch bishop stated his words as follows: f The Sacred Heart of our Lord being united with the Divinity, is deified, and is therefore an object of Divine Worship.'

That is, the Human Heart immediately united with the Person of our Lord is united with the Divine Nature, and thereby deified. Therefore it shares in the Divine Worship.

Such, then, is the ratio formalis of deification, namely, union with the Person of the Son, and in Him, with the Divine Nature: and such is the hypostatic union of the two Natures in the One Person of our Lord.

What shall we say, then, of Dr. Nicholson's — we will not call it theology, but Christianity, as exhibited in the following words? — ' From the phrase Caro Verbi you infer.... the Deification of the Caro. This surely is particularly feeble. Every Catholic theologian knows the interpretation of such phrases.'

Most assuredly, as we have shown above; but also most assuredly Dr. Nicholson does not.

We need only quote one sentence in proof. ' If the Archbishop means to reason thus " Deus mortuus est," ergo the Humanity is Deity, it would not be difficult to classify this sophism.'

We confess ourselves conquered. To us it would be difficult to qualify this comic impertinence. Has Dr. Nicholson ever read S. John's words? — ' In this we have known the charity of God, because He hath laid down His life for us.'35 Does he believe Christ to be God? Does he believe that Christ died for us? Let us advise him to leave off lecturing Catholic theologians till he has learned his Catechism.

Moreover he says: ' " by facer e Deum, I presume is meant to deify as Verm Deus;" by Dei facere, to deify in some sense which is less than Vents Deus. The facere Deum is facere Deum qui cst Dens: the " Dei facere" is "facere Deum qui post hoc non est Deus." ' This he calls a ' Deus non Deus,' and adds sapiently, ' This distinction is surely nothing less than a red. ad absurdnm.' Beyond doubt. But to whose absurdity"?

FIFTH ARTICLE.

FINAL ESTIMATE OF DR. NICHOLSON'S THEOLOGY.

Our readers must be as weary as we are of Dr. Nicholson. But in our second article we made a promise which we must redeem; and then we hope to have done with him. We promised that we would take account of his conduct in this correspondence with F. Guiron. This we will now do under two heads; the first shall be what manner of Theologian, and the second what manner of man, he is.

Now in estimating the former we will confine our-

35 1 S. John iii. 16.

selves to the quotations which he has either interpreted or adduced. They are ahout fourteen in number, and of these we will give a brief account.

I. First, Perrone was quoted by F. Guiron to show that divine worship is given to the Person of the Word, < in itself and for itself:' and to the Humanity subsist ing in Him, 'in itself but not for itself.' Dr. Nicholson starts by calling Perrone ' Du Perron,' knowing as little of the man as of his meaning. Perhaps he took him for Cardinal Du Perron, who lived in the seventeenth century, as a French traveller, at Moscow, took Plato the patriarch for Plato the philosopher. We note this because before we have done we shall show Dr. Nichol son as setting up for a grave authority about Catholic theologians.

Now for Perrone's words. Dr. Nicholson interprets them as follows:

1. That divine worship is due to God alone; there fore,

2. That it is not to be given to the Sacred Humanity. Perrone expressly says that it is to be given < in itself but not for itself,' which Dr. Nicholson plainly did not so much as understand; for, if he did, his flat contradiction of Perrone's statement is a worse fault.

II. F. Guiron next referred Dr. Nicholson to S. Athanasius for the use of the word Deify. We gave in our fourth article seven quotations from his works: four from the Orations against the Arians, and three from his other writings.

Dr. Nicholson answers, ' As regards the reference to S. Athanasius, I can find nothing in the Orations c. Ar. (sic), or elsewhere in the works of that Catholic Father, which can support the proposition.'

Dr. Nicholson pretends to know, or to have read, or to have searched S. Athanasius, especially the Orations. Why not honestly tell the truth? He knew nothing about S. Athanasius.

III. F. Guiron next quoted Franzelin, proving by direct words the divine worship of the Sacred Humanity: and especially of the Sacred Heart, as the special organ of the ' operationes deiviriles' of the Incarnate Word.

Dr. Nicholson knew, if possible, less who Franzelin is than he did who Perrone is.

But he answers, ' Allowing any weight you may claim for it, the thesis lends no support to the error.' What error? Franzelin makes the very same two asser tions which F. Guiron and the Archbishop had made.

The passage quoted explicitly asserts the Divine Adoration, and implicitly the Deification, of the Sacred Humanity. But Dr. Nicholson was incapable of under standing the very terminology.

IV. Next F. Guiron gave Dr. Nicholson a scent of the Fifth (Ecumenical Council. This was new life to him; but it has been his ruin.

Dr. Nicholson's incredible blunder about the two Adorations we have exposed both in the first and the second article of this series. We will say no more now, because we have something more of the same kind in store for him.

V. F. Guiron then quoted the Constitution of Pius VI., ' Auctorem Fidei,' by which the errors renewed by Dr. Nicholson were condemned in the Synod of Pistoia.

He evidently knew nothing about it. He says, ' You quote no part of it, and I might not unreasonably wait until you do.' From this it is certain that he was ignorant that the 61, 62, and 63 Propositions condemned by the ' Auctorem Fidei' relate to the devotion of the Sacred Heart by name. Yet he pretends to be ready to discuss it. ' I am not unwilling to discuss it on occasion.' On what occasion, if not on this? But Dr. Nicholson was evidently once more concealing his ignorance under a pretence of superior knowledge.

VI. Now we come to an event in this correspondence. Down to this point Dr. Nicholson had literally done nothing but misinterpret quotations given to him by F. Guiron.

It so happened that by a strange chance we heard of Dr. Nicholson at this date in great activity, searching for Catholic books, in Bath. His next letter is dated ' Bath.' And there he has found ' Doctor Peter Dens,' of whom he says with a tone of patronage to F. Guiron, ' with whose works you are no doubt familiar.' We can imagine F. Guiron may indeed have heard of Dens; but we will engage that he has drawn his theology out of deeper wells.

However, now for Dens:

'Non recte enim dicitur de Christo (ut docet S. Thomas, Art. 7) Homo factus est Deus.'

' Obj.-Vera est haec propositio, &c.'

Now, will it be believed that this scrap, which Dr. Nicholson gives as a continuous quotation, without sign of garbling, is completely garbled and its sense changed?

Dr. Nicholson has omitted the whole of Dens' assertion. Between the sentences quoted by him are these words. He says, We cannot rightly say, ' Homo factus est Deus: Significaretur enim quod Persona Verbi facta esset in tempore Deus: vel quod aliquis homo prceexistens factus esset Deus.'

Does Dr. Nicholson mean that F. Guiron ever asserted that the ' Word became God in time,' or that ' Some man already in existence was made God'?

If he dares to say this, let him put his finger on the words.

If he cannot do so, he is convicted of either a patent false accusation, or once more of a pretence at knowledge in which he is evidently and culpably wan ting.

After this he has, we cannot refrain from saying, the effrontery to write as follows: ' Any proposition co ordinate with this Respons. (sic) I am free to grant.' We are bound to confess that he is beyond us here. Unless we have lost our senses, these words are absolutely without meaning.

He then goes on:

' Thus the dogmatic theologian Dens shows the fallacy on which your reasoning rests.' F. Guiron had affirmed that it is true and Catholic to say, ' Deus mortuus est.' Dr. Nicholson, in refutation, quotes this scrap of Dens. And yet Dens himself just before, that is on the fourth page before this quotation, says: ' Recte dicitur, Deu&, sive filius Dei, natus est ex Virgine, passus, mortuus'™ We do not quote Dens to show that it is right to say, * Deus mortuus est;' for the

36 Reg. i. ii. De Com. Idiom, torn. v. p. 21.

whole Catholic theology proves it. We quote Dens, which he had in his hand, to convict Dr. Nicholson of want of knowledge or want of sincerity.

VII. But we have not yet done with Dens, who was found by Dr. Nicholson at Bath, to his own un doing. Whoever gave it to him gave him indeed a $£gO» aft&gov. He then quotes the passage we treated in our third article in the following way. ' Dr. Dens37 speaks thus: Interim cum S. Thoma observandum quod Humanitas Christi concepta per mentem ut separata a Persona Verbi, non sit colenda cultu Latrias, sed HyperduliaB, quia sic Humanitas abstracta, et omnis perfectio quas ei inest, est creata.'

We have already abundantly proved:

1. That S. Thomas and all theologians teach that the Sacred Humanity never in reality existed separate from the Person of the Word, nor, to all eternity, ever can.

2. That to the Sacred Humanity, so indissolubly united to the Word, the divine worship of latria is due.

3. That the Humanity of Christ separate from the Word, non-existent except by mental abstraction, would be only a res creata; and therefore an object at most of hyperdulia.

We have demonstrated in our last article but one, that this has no more to do with the question than the 37th Problem of the First Book of Euclid.

But we quote it here again to convict Dr. Nicholson once more. He takes this from Dens, torn. i. p. 39. His quotation is the four last lines of the page. No- 37 Tractatus de Incar. No. 23.

body would believe that the whole paragraph going before affirms what F. Guiron had said, and refutes what Dr. Nicholson was saying. Dens says: ' Adoratur enim Humanitas ut subsistens in Verbo; et sic subsistentia, sive Persona, Verbi simul adoratur ut causa adorationis,' i.e. cultu Latrice.

VIII. We have already dealt in former articles with the Fifth (Ecumenical Council. If Dr. Nicholson knows or means what he says, he is under its anathema, for he has declared:

1. That divine worship is due to the Divine Nature in Christ.

2. That to the Human Nature in Christ is due only hyperdulia.

Therefore he thus introduces two Adorations of the two natures separation: which denies the unity of the Incarnate Word; and is condemned under anathema by the Fifth Council.

IX. But books are fatal to Dr. Nicholson. He next quotes the homily of S. Proclus in the Council of Ephesus: 'Neque hominem deificatum prasdicamus, sed Deum Incarnatum confitemur.' This, he says, condemns the dogma that the Sacred Humanity is deified and wor shipped with latria. Will it be believed that the words preceding this quotation are as follows? —

' He who by nature was impassible, through pity became full of suffering. Christ did not become God by increase (of merit, IK vgozoTrfe); God forbid the thought: but through pity He became man. We do not preach a deified man, but the Incarnate God.'38 38 S. Prodi Horn. sect. iv.; Labbe, Condi, torn. iii. p. 580.

Now, did Dr. Nicholson, or did he not, know this context? If he did not, what might we not justly say of this ignorance, coupled with his daring to accuse Catholic teachers of heresy? If he did know it, we leave him to the judgment of all honest men.

S. Proclus was refuting the Nestorians, who affirmed Christ to he a human Person; the Son of Mary, but not the Eternal Son of God.

X. But, if possible, we have worse coming. Dr. Nicholson quotes the Epistle of S. Cyril, read in the Fifth (Ecumenical Council, as condemning F. Guiron's assertion that the Sacred Humanity is deified and wor shipped as subsisting in the Word.

S. Cyril's words are these: ' We guard against saying of Christ, " for His sake who puts on (humanity) I venerate him who is put on" (8/a rov fogowrot roi> <pogov[Atvoi>); "for His sake who is invisible I worship him who is visible,"... " he who is assumed co-exists as God with Him that assumes (him)." He who says these things cuts asunder (Christ) into two Christs, and makes a man apart by himself, and God likewise apart by Himself.'39

Is it possible that Dr. Nicholson did not see that S. Cyril is refuting the Nestorian doctrine of two Per sons in Christ? We have inserted the original in one place as a sample, because the article which runs all through shows, if possible, more clearly what he was asserting. Dr. Nicholson might have been warned by the ' eum' and ' eum,' and ' qui,' and ' ille,' and ' ei,' which he prints in capitals. But he was so full of the

39 Epist. S. Cyril, &c. s. vi.; Labbe, Condi, torn. iii. p. 950.

desire to assail F. Guiron, that even the ' in duos' did not open his eyes. The whole is simply irrelevant. What has all this to do with the Sacred Humanity in, or even separate mentally from, the one Person of the Word? Does Dr. Nicholson accuse F. Guiron of de nying that Mary is Mother of God? If not, how can he accuse him of making two Persons in Christ? The fact is Dr. Nicholson did not understand what he was saying, how much less wThat he was quoting.

XI. We now come to Dr. Nicholson's quotations from Bellarmine, which are, if possible, more fatal to him than those from Dens. He quotes Bellarmine to prove that ' the Humanity of Christ is not (sic) an ob-, ject of Latria.' For this he quotes 'Lib. de Rel. et Imag. Sanct.,' without number of book, chapter, or section. We can, however, help him to them.

The passage he quotes does not exist at all in the Lib. de Eeliquiis, &c. It is to be found in lib. i. c. xii. De Beatitudine, dec. Sanctorum.

Here is Dr. Nicholson's first blunder. His second is the old story over again: that hyperdulia is to be given ' soli Humanitati Christi et Matri ejus.' This we have answered ten times already.

Now if Dr. Nicholson had really known the Book de Reliquiis, he would have found an answer to his perversion of Bellarmine's words. In ch. xxiv. s. 14, Bellarmine says, ' Ambrose means to say that Christ is One, as God, and as crucified: and therefore, when Christ is adored as God, the humanity is not separated from Him; and when Christ is adored as crucified, the Divinity is not separated.'

And immediately after he says:

' True latria belongs to Christ when He is adored as He is in Himself, not, however, when He is adored (how does Dr. Nicholson think? in the sola humanitas separata, &c.?) — when He is adored as He is in an Image by participation.' Is the Sacred Humanity an Image?

Now, as we have fallen on this point again, it may be as well to give Dr. Nicholson one more quotation from Bellarmine. He says: ' What Gregory of Nazianzum says to Chelidonius, that the Flesh by the Incarnation is deified, has this sense, that it is made the Flesh of God by union with the Word, not made God by conversion into the Divinity.'40

Finally, we come to his quotation from the 20th chap, of this book, in which he expresses his surprise that, not F. Guiron, but that the Archbishop of West minster, should ' either dissent from, or not be aware of, the doctrine of Cultus in the Roman Church.' There is in this an exquisite impertinence. Let us see the result.

Dr. Nicholson proceeds: * You did me the favour in the first letter to call my attention to a passage of Perrone;' i.e. F. Guiron quoted the words, ' in se, et propter se,' and ' in se, non tamen propter se.' This, he says, refutes F. Guiron's position, namely, that the Sacred Humanity is to be adored with latria, ' not for itself,' but for the divinity of the Incarnate Word. He proves this assertion in the following way: ' It appears to me strange that a difficulty should be raised as to 40 Lib. iii. c. iv. 2.

the significance and application of phrases so familiar to Eoman theologians as adoratio propter se and ado-ratio in se.' The difficulty was altogether of his own making. F. Guiron never made it. Bellarmine, Dr. Nicholson says, explains the expressions clearly enough. Let us hear the explanation. The 'adoratio propter se' is paid to that object which has in itself the essential reason of the worship, depending on itself, and not on any other thing; ' quod habet in se rationis vim, non dependentem aliunde.' This is what F. Guiron and Perrone put more concisely ' in se et propter se/ and affirm of adoration as given to the divinity of the Incarnate Word. Dr. Nicholson then adds, ' The ado-ratio in se, the full expression of which is adoratio in se propter allied, is the adoration of an object which contains within itself the cause or motlvum (Perrone) of the worship; which cause, however, altogether de pends on some other thing — quod habet in se causam honoris, sedilia causa tota pendet ab alio.'41

Now will it be believed that the passage from which these words are garbled is the following?—' Potest aliquid honorari propter se, vel propter aliud. Id honoratur propter se, quod habet in se rationern venerationis non dependentem aliunde; et hoc modo sola natura rationalis est venerabilis. Propter aliud hono ratur id, quod habet quidem in se causam honoris, sedilia causa tota pendet ab alio: et hoc modo signa rerum sacrarum sunt venerabilia; habent enim in se relationem similitudinis sive representationem rei sacra, et proinde quandam excellentiam, sedilia tota pendet ab ipsa re

41 See Bellarmine, Lib. de Eel. xx. 14. VOL. II. E sacra.' Is the Sacred Humanity a similitude or a representation? Bellamrine, after laying down these principles as to the worship — not of the Incarnate Word with His Humanity, as Dr. Nicholson evidently thinks, hut of IMAGES — proceeds in this way to apply them.

In c. xxv. 1, he says: ' Neither Latria, nor Hyperdulia, nor Dulia, can properly he given to images: nor any other such worship as is paid to an intelligent nature.'

What, then, has this to do with the adoration of the Sacred Humanity?

Is it not an intelligent nature?

Did not Dr. Nicholson affirm 'with Bellarmine' that hyperdulia is to be paid to it?

The fact is, that Dr0 Nicholson did not know that Bellarmine, in the whole of this book, is treating of the relative worship due to images, not of the absolute worship due to the Incarnate Word.

Yet Dr. Nicholson had before his eyes these words: * True latria is due to Christ when He is adored as He is in Himself (i.e. God and Man), but not when He is.adored as He is in an image by participation.^2

And again: ' The image of Christ represents Christ, that is, the Divine Person clothed in human.Jlesh.... Otherwise the Apostles, when they saw Christ in the flesh, ought not to have adored Him with latria: nor ought Thomas to have said, My Lord and my God. For they did not see Christ as God, but as man.'43

These words are in the very column next to Dr. Nicholson's quotation.

According to Dr. Nicholson, Bellarmine's argument «2C.xxiv. 21. «C. xxi. 2.

is, The image of Christ is not adored in itself, but as a representation of Christ.

Therefore the Sacred Humanity is not to be adored in itself.

Does Dr. Nicholson mean that the Sacred Humanity is a representation? If so, of what? If not, what does all this pomp of quotation of the Lib. de ReL, and of 'the phrases so familiar to Roman theologians,' mean? Certainly they are familiar to a Catholic child: but not in any way familiar to Dr. Nicholson. In the Penny Catechism our children learn to say and to understand as follows:

Q. Is it allowable to honour relics, crucifixes, and holy pictures?

A. Yes: with an inferior and relative honour: as they relate to Christ and His saints, and are memorials of them.

Q. May we not pray to relics or images?

A. No, by no means: for they have no life or sense to help us.

Here are Bellarmine's very words. But what has this to do with the absolute and divine worship of the Incarnate Word?

XII. Dr. Nicholson quotes the eighth of S. Cyril's Twelve Anathematisms. We have fully answered this amazing, ignorance already, and have shown that the ' alterum cum altero adorari,' that is ' one (Person) with another' (Person), is a condemnation of the Nestorian adoration of two Persons in Christ, and has no shadow of bearing upon the question between Dr. Nicholson and F. Guiron. The man who can think so shows that he does not understand either the Nestorian heresy or the doctrine of the Incarnation.

And here we will redeem the promise made in our second article.

Dr. Nicholson says that the Divine Word ' holds a possessive relation in respect to Caro; what the precise modus of that possession is, the Catholic faith defines in the Doctrine of the Hypostatic union.'

On this we have to say that the doctrine of the hypostatic union is defined by the Church, not as ' a possessive relation in respect to Caro,' which is simple Nestorianism, but, as Dens will tell Dr. Nicholson, ' est unio qua natura humana, realiter et substantialiter sic est unita Persons Divinse Yerbi, ut in illahabeat suam subsistentiam: The Church uses the word ' unio^ expressly to exclude all equivocal terms, such as 'relation,' or 'inhabitation,' or 'conjunction,' or 'operation,' and the like.

Therefore the fourth Canon of the Fifth Council says: ' If any man say that the union of God the Word with Humanity was made according to grace, or according to operation, or according to equality of honour, or according to relation (rtfffiv), &c., and shall not confess that the union of God the Word was made with the flesh, with the life and soul rational and intellectual, that is, according to hypostatic union (as the holy Fathers have taught), and that therefore His Person is one, who is the Lord Jesus Christ, one (Person) of the Holy Trinity, let such man be anathema.' We do not say that Dr. Nicholson is under the anathema, for he knows nothing about it; but we advise him to learn the terminology of the Church, and not to invent senseless verbiage on doctrines defined by it.

Dr. Nicholson comes back once more with Dens.

' It seems strange/ he says, ' that Archbishop Manning should not be aware of the common dictum, " Non omne illud quod coadoratur cultu Latria debet esse ipsc Deus." ' Now this ' common dictum' is no dictum at all; it is half a premiss made for the occasion. But let that pass. Will it be believed that Dens' next words are, ' sed sufficit quod sit Personce Divince substantialiter conjunetum:' which half of the premiss Dr. Nicholson deliberately suppresses? Dens is actually and expressly proving what Dr. Nicholson is actually and expressly denying; namely, that the Sacred Humanity, though it be not ipse Dem, i.e. the Person of God, is to be worshipped with latria. Dr. Nicholson, as his wont is, carefully mutilates the words of Dens, and uses them to deny that the Sacred Humanity is to be worshipped at all with latria, because it is not ' God,' i.e. the Divine Nature. Dens here affirms that it is to be so worshipped because it is united with God. We are beginning to believe that Dr. Nicholson does not know black from white.

XIV. We now come to the last quotation; and to the end of our task. Dr. Nicholson writes:

' The error of literally predicating Divine attributes of the Humanity, and vice versa, is well rebuked by the Augustinian Thad. Perusini (sic) preaching before the Council of Trent.'

The words of F. Thaddeus, of Perugia, are: ' They who endeavour to meditate piously and without error on the wonderful and Divine works of Christ,' must keep before their minds the two natures, Divine and Human, which still retained their own operations and fulfilled their own offices. For, he adds, ' Those things which are proper (conveniunt) to Christ as God, no way are proper (conveniunt) to Him as Man. And those things which are proper to Him as Man, it would be a sin to ascribe to Him as God.'

That is to say, you cannot say of Christ that He died as God, nor can you say of Christ that He is Omnipresent as Man. You can say of Christ, God and Man, both that He died, and that He is Omnipresent.

Very sound doctrine, but very irrelevant. You cannot say of Christ, as God, that He hungered. You cannot say of Christ, as Man, that before Abraham was He was.

But we have no need to interpret F. Thaddeus's words. He does it himself; but, as before, Dr. Nicholson puts his hand over ' Perusini's ' mouth in the midst of his sentence.

Our readers will hardly believe what we now add. Dr. Nicholson breaks off his quotation at a colon, and puts a full stop. F. Thaddeus's next words are: ' but inasmuch as they are joined together, as we have said, by an indissoluble and inexplicable link in one and the same Hypostasis, most frequently what.things are of (i.e. belong to) the Divine Nature are ascribed to (Him as) Man, what things ars of (or belong to) the Human Nature are ascribed to (Him as) God.'44 44 Le Plat, Hist. Con. Trid. torn. i. p. 399.

Dr. Nicholson not only cannot understand his quotations, but he cannot extract them faithfully.

F. Thaddeus's assertions are nothing more than the communicatio idiomatum, not in abstracts to the Natures, but in concrete, i.e. in the Person. This Dr. Nicholson in his grand way calls, ' The common place Communicatio idiomatum is a forma loquendi, well understood.' By whom?

F. Thaddeus then goes on to say that the Ascension, on which festival he was preaching, cannot be ascribed to the Divinity, for He was in heaven al ready. Also, he adds, Christ did not forsake the earth even as Man (quemadmodum impii quidam senserunt haeretici), because He has left us His Body, ' sub Divini Sacramenti tegumento obtectum,' hid under the veil of the Divine Sacrament.

We have now done with Dr. Nicholson's quota tions.

It remains for us now to sum up the case against Dr. Nicholson, and then to take an estimate of what manner of Theologian he is:

1. We have shown that he did not even know the name of Perrone; that he did not understand his words; and that he made him say the direct contradictory of his own proposition, and of the doctrine of the Catholic Church.

2. That he pretended to know, or to have searched, the works of S. Athanasius: and denied, contrary to fact as we have shown, that they contain the Deification of the Humanity of Christ.

3. That without so much as understanding Franzelin's words, or ever having seen the outside of his book, he denies his plain and explicit teaching.

4. That he applies the condemnation of Nestorianism, by the Fifth (Ecumenical Council, to the Catholic doctrine that Christ is to be adored in His two natures with latria.

5. That he did not even know the condemnations of the Constitution ' Auctorem Fidei;' and yet, pretending to know it all, professed his readiness ' to discuss it on occasion.'

6. That he represents Dens as denying latria to the Sacred Humanity, Verio unita, because he had fallen upon the assertion that a Persona VerU, per mentis conceptionem, separata, it is to be worshipped with hyperdulia.

7. That he either did not know that Dens in the very same treatise affirmed the doctrine of the Archbishop; or, knowing it, he suppressed it.

8. That he distinctly affirms that two Adorations are to be given to the two Natures subsisting in Christ, latria and hyperdulia respectively.

9. That he suppresses half of the statement of S. Proclus and altogether perverts his meaning. This we are ready to believe was from utter incapacity.

10. That with S. Cyril's letter before him, and the Nestorian doctrine of two Persons plainly expressed in it, even in the Latin translation, by ' eum,' ' eum,' and ' ille,' &c., showing the two persons of the Nestorians, he pretended that it applies to the adoration of the Sacred Humanity subsisting in the One Person of the Incarnate Word.

11. That he quotes as from the Liber de Reliquiis of Bellarmine a passage which does not exist in it. And where it does exist, in the Liber de Sanctorum Beatificatione, its meaning is perverted by Dr. Nichol son in direct contradiction of Bellarmine's explicit teaching. Moreover, through complete want of elementary knowledge, he mixes up the distinct ques tions of Absolute and Eelative worship; and applies what Bellarmine says of the worship of images to the worship of the Sacred Humanity subsisting in the Incarnate Word.

12. That he again mistakes S. Cyril's anathematism against Nestorius as applicable to the devotion of the Sacred Heart.

13. That he has directly inverted the argument of Dens, who was affirming that latria is due to the Sacred Humanity, and converted it into a denial of that doctrine by a suppression, which we do not know how to believe to have been unconscious, of one half of a premiss, mutilating words and sense, and changing an affirmative into a negative proposition.

14. That in like manner he suppressed one half of a sentence of F. Thaddeus, making him to say the direct reverse of what he was saying, and thereby suppressing the fact that F. Thaddeus precisely con firms F. Guiron's argument from the doctrine of the Communicatio idiomatum: with which Dr. Nicholson pretends to be so familiar as to pity the Archbishop for his ignorance of it.

So great a mass of pretentious and supercilious blundering, and so many distinct mutilations of the words pretended as the text of authors, and as their i2Jsissima verba, we have never seen in so small a compass as in Dr. Nicholson's seven letters.

And so we will leave him, adding only two quota tions of his words.

' In respect to the distinction now proposed: by facer e Deum I presume is meant, " to deify as Verus Deus;" by Dei facere, to deify in some sense which is less than Verus Deus. The " facere Deum " is "facere Deum qui est Deus:" the "Dei facere" is facere Deum qui post hoc non est Deus.'

It would be cruel to criticise the Latin. We will only ask, Is this the man to call S. Athanasius a Catholic Father in whose works is to be found no thing to support the proposition that the ' Caro facta Dei is deified '?

To pretend learning which we have not in medicine is a moral obliquity. What is it, then, to pretend learning which we have not in theology?

Once more: in his parting letter Dr. Nicholson says: ' I have had no controversy whatever with Ro man Theologians; but simply with certain interpretations of them, which are obviously untenable.'

That is to say: You did not know your own theo logians till I arose with Dens to expound them.

But does he sincerely mean that he will accept what Roman theologians teach? If so, he will soon be a wiser man. If he will not accept it, then' it is not F. Guiron's interpretation but the Holy Catholic Faith which he reviles and rejects.

Let him rest in peace. No Roman theologians will contend with him till they see that he can under stand them. Then he will be worth answering, but not till then. He will therefore long remain in peace.

We have only one more office to discharge. We have seen what manner of theologian Dr. Nicholson is. It only remains to see also what manner of man. We do not trust our own appreciations: and he might think them unjust. We will therefore learn it of himself.

For this purpose, having analysed the argument of this correspondence, we will now collect its flowers.

' You declared,' he says to the Archbishop in his first letter, ' that the Human Nature of the Blessed Redeemer is deified in consequence of its having been assumed by the Divine Son. Immediately after the service I addressed a Roman ecclesiastic. He had noticed the same statement of the preacher; he sought by qualification to reduce it to some conformity with the Catholic faith; but failing to do so to my satisfaction, and evidently labouring under a confusion of thought and an incapability of which he did not seem wholly unconscious, he finally referred me for an ex planation to his Archbishop.'

' It is due to the attention which Archbishop Manning has given to the subject, &c.'

' The Archbishop essays to change his position.'

' Such propositions or illustrations tend to a mere verbal confusion, and are instances of a well-known fallacy.'

'I must take leave to say that you misinterpret your author.'

' The heresy here is patent.'

' The reasoning is an ordinary fallacy, and the thing assumed is against the Catholic faith.'

'Archbishop Manning has misapprehended the teaching of Perrone.'

' You change your position for a second time.'

' It is only possible to answer this reckless assertion by a direct contradiction — the Roman Church does not teach any such thing.'

'I certainly cannot conceal my surprise that you (the Archbishop) either dissent from, or cannot be aware of, the doctrine of Cultus in the Roman Church.'

'It serves no purpose to iterate references to the doctrines and practice of the Church, while both are rejected and ignored,' i.e. by the Archbishop.

'I would now beg of you once more to study a pass age adduced by yourself.'

' Nothing in the course of this correspondence has affected me with more surprise than the imperfect knowledge of the rudiments of Roman dogmatic theo logy which it betrays.'

' I should have supposed that the least acquaintance with such dogmatic works as those of Dens or of Cardinal Bellarmine would have rendered such blunders impossible.'

' To produce a document and to confess ignorance as to its validity' (i.e. a Pontifical Constitution ex cathedra) ' discovers remarkable weakness and perplexity.'

' The chief Pastor of the Roman Church in Eng land,' &c. &c., as quoted before.

' When asked for an explanation, the preacher quotes authorities which are proved to he fresh heresies, and which are incompatible with the rudiments of the theo logy of his Church.'

' In this grave matter I have no alternative hut to hring the charge of heresy against your teaching.'

' Unless you fully retract the heresy, I reserve to myself the right of publishing this correspondence.'

' If, as you consider, you have in the present case answered all reasonable inquiries, the force of the reasoning might have been left to assert itself luithout the present plea ad misericordiam.'

Ne respondeas stulto juxta stultitiam suam, ne efficiaris ei similis.

Kesponde stulto juxta stultitiam suam, ne sibi sapiens esse videatur.

Vidisti hominem sapientem sibi videri? magis illo spem habebit insipiens.45

In reading these utterances of lofty wisdom and compassionate authority, we have been at times inclined to believe that the whole of the correspondence was an elaborate hoax. Its pompous absurdity and exquisite nonsense reminded us of Swift's prophecy and condolence with Mr. Isaac Bickerstaff on the mournful event of his own death. But one thing in it seemed to us to be real: namely, the intense desire to wither up the Archbishop with scornful commiseration, and patronise him with condescending enlightenment. F. 45 Prov. xxvi. 4, 5, 12.¹

Guiron, who was face to face with Dr. Nicholson, utterly disappears. It is the Archbishop who 'bestows attention,' and ' cannot but know,' and ' is ignorant of rudiments,' and is not aware of the Roman doctrine of 1 cultus,' aliaque poene innumerabilia.

This amusing and irrepressible determination to get at the Archbishop, and to hold him up sky-high as a heretic, reveals itself at once in the first letter, and betrays the intention to lay a trap. What if it should turn out after all that Dr. Nicholson's trap, when opened, will be found empty: or that the trapper is trapped himself?

We say this because the Bev. F. Guiron has given us leave to print the following letter:

' S. Michael's, Hereford, Sept. 28, 1873.

' My dear F. Guiron, — On Wednesday last, as I was coming in the train from Manchester to Worcester, I read for the first time your correspondence with Dr. Nicholson in the Guardian.

' Until then my knowledge of the whole affair was confined to his first letter, which I read when I gave it to you to answer, and his last, which, as the cor respondence was closed, I put, without reading it, into the basket. Of all his intermediate letters I knew nothing, and with your answers my only contact was that I suggested to you certain books and references for your first letter. I remember that I heard you read a paragraph or two of your second; and when I afterwards found that, unknown to me, it was still going on, I told you to waste no more time upon it, and also in what terms to close the correspondence.

'Having now read your letters, I think it due to you to say that they are perfectly sound, Catholic, and unanswerable. If you had made any slip in doc trine, I should have taken upon myself the full responsibility; on the just rule, quod facit per alium facit per se. I take now the full responsibility of saying that you have not only made no such slip, but have done your work thoroughly well.

' It is a just retribution that Dr. Nicholson, who began by accusing me and one of my clergy as either ignorant or unable to defend my words, should after all fall into your hands, and learn to his cost that he had better leave Catholic priests alone.

(His solemn appeals to me all through, and my excommunication as a heretic at last, are very amusing.

' I cannot end this letter without saying that I admire in your letters nothing more than the calm, grave, respectful tone with which you bore with an assailant very unlike yourself. It is a sign of the love of truth and of souls. I hope Dr. Nicholson is a young man; for if he be an old one, you, at the outset of your priesthood, have read him a sharp lesson on the manner which befits the treatment of sacred things. He will have learned also that Catholic priests know their theology better than he can teach them, and that it is not safe to accuse even an Archbishop. May every blessing be with you and your work.

'Believe me always yours affectionately in Jesus Christ,

' >%< HENRY EDWARD,

'Archbishop of Westminster.''

Footnotes

1. Finally, the whole correspondence is no ordinary instance of confusion of thought and language.' ↩