The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1839-10-18 00:00:00

THE OXFORD TRACTS.--BISHOP WILSON'S
CHARGE TO THE CLERGY OF CALCUTTA.

(From the Christian Observer.)

A CHARGE DELIVERED TO THE CLERGY OF THE DIOCESE
OF CALCUTTA, JULY 6TH, 1838, BY THE RIGHT REV.
DANIEL WILSON, D.D., BISHOP OF CALCUTTA AND
METROPOLITAN.
(Continued from our last.)

Dr. Pusey has lately addressed a letter to the Bishop of
Oxford, which is sufficiently quiet, guarded, and wary, to si-
lence the scruples of those who do not go to the root of the
whole question, upon the solid scciptural principles, zealously
maintained, even to the flames of martyrdom, by such men
as those to whom the Oxford memorial is about to be erected;
but it contains no argument in favour of the peculiarities of
the Oxford Tract system, which has not been again and again
refuted in the contests of the champions of Protestantism
against Popery. We say " the peculiarities" of the Oxford
Tract system, because the defenders of that system, when
pressed in argument, always contrive to mix up what is pecu-
liar to their alleged Via Media, with what really belongs to
the true Via Media of Anglicanism, as distinguished from Po-
pery on the one hand, and non-episcopal Protestantism on
the other ; so that in refuting what is extraneous, extravagant,
unscriptural, or superstitious, in their opinions relative to
episcopacy, the sacraments, and the church, we are exposed
to the gross misrepresentation of not adhering to the Apos-
tolical doctrines and rites of the Anglican communion; whereas
the very question is, what those doctrines and rites are; and
with regard to the real via media, we beg leave to say that
the Church of England opposers of the peculiarities of the
Oxford Tract system, (witness the names we have already
mentioned) have never swerved from expressing their con-
scientious and zealous attachment to the Prayer-book, Ar-
ticles, and Homilies of the Church of England ; whereas the
Tractators are always intimating that some things went too
far and others not far enough ; that the Homilies are unscrip-
tural ; the Articles fundamentally defective, though not posi-
tively untenable ; and the Prayer-book itself sadly garbled,
mangled, and diluted, to please the taste of Protestantism ;
that we need a reform backward ; and that our " dear sister"
Rome—though far from perfect, and requiring salutary amend-
ment—has been shamefully maligned ; that almost all her al-
leged false doctrines and superstitions may be accepted in a
good sense ; and that, in short, what is really Protestantism
(which they deny Anglicanism to be) is worse that Popery.
We are not, however, without episcopal remonstrators ;
and we trust their number will increase, now that the true
character of the Tracts has become notorious, and the great
evils resulting from them manifest. The Bishop of Chester
has discharged his conscience in the following solemn warn-
ing to his clergy :
. . . _

Many subjects present themselves, towards which I must
be tempted to direct your thoughts. One more especially
concerns the Church at present, because it is daily assuming
more serious and alarming aspect, and threatens a revival
of the worst evils of the Romish system. Under the spacious
pretence of deference to antiquity and respect for primitive
models, the foundations of our Protestant church are under-
mined by men who dwell within her walls •, and those who sit
in the Reformers' seat are traducing the Reformation. It is
again becoming matter of question, whether the Bible is suf-
ficient to make wise unto salvation ' • the main article of our
National Confession—justification by faith—is both openly
and covertly assailed ; and the stewards of the mystery of
grace are instructed to reserve the truth which they have been
ordained to dispense, and to hide under a bushel those doc-
trines which the apostles were commanded to preach to every
creature."

The question of tradition is not an indifferent matter. The
canon of revelation is either closed or it is not. We maintain
that is closed with the last chapter of the Apocalypse ; and
that " If any man shall add to these things, God shall add to
him the plagues that are written in this book." Now there
are those who say that tradition is as much the word of God
as the written word, they therefore add it to the written word.
How do they construe this denunciation ? To us it sounds
fearfully, as applied to this case. We have however neither
the warrant nor the wish so to apply it ; but, in all solemnity,
we must affirm, that we have lately read tracts and sermons
on tradition, which we could see no way of excluding from
this awful woe. It is no reply to say, "We mean apostolic
traditions," for there is no exception made for the case of
alleged apostolic traditions ; all the traditions which were di-
vinely intended to be retained are " written in this book."
But after all, what can we prove, in the nineteenth century,
to be apostolic traditions ? Of the inaccuracy of oral convey-
ance, we have a remarkable illustration in our Lord's own
history : " Jesus said, If I will that he tarry till I come, what
is that to thee ? follow thou me. Then went this saying
abroad among the brethren, that this disciple should not die;
yet Jesus said not unto him, He shall not die ; but, If I will
that he tarry till I come, what is that to thee ?" (John xxi
23.) Here then a saying went abroad among the brethren,
alleged to be uttered by our Divine Lord himself, his apostles
themselves being the ear-witnesses ; and yet it was grounded
upon a mistake, as St. John shews by quoting the exact
words ; and the words, as written, are clear enough, though
orally they were mistaken. Taking this incident with the
next two verses, which conclude St. John's gospel, we cannot
but think that the Holy Ghost recorded it expressly as a
warning against listening to anything as divine or apostolical,
but what is expressly " written for our learning ;" for imme-
diately after shewing what a mistake had gone abroad re-
specting our Lord's saying, which is corrected by writing
down for all ages the exact words, the inspired writer goes
on to say that " there are also many other things which Jesus
did, the which, if they should be written, everyone, I suppose
that the world itself could not contain the books that should
be written." It was probable, therefore, that many deeds
and sayings of our Lord would be remembered and spoken
of after his death ; but as if to shew us that no authority was
to be ascribed to these transmitted recollections, the mistake
above alluded to is significantly pointed out, as a warning
against placing implicit confidence in oral statements; the
inspired narrator immediately adding, •"This is the disciple
which testifieth of these things, and wrote these things, and
we know that his testimony is true." In like manner, St.
John had said in the chapter before, (the twentieth, verses
30, 31,) that " Many other signs truly did Jesus in the pre-
sence of his disciples, which are not written in thisbook ; but
these are written, that ye might believe that Jesus is the
Christ." One of our Lord's sayings which the Holy Ghost
intended that we should possess, though not recorded in the
four gospels, is expressly recorded for our instruction in the
Acts of the Apostles (Acts xx. 35,) " Remember the words
of the Lord Jesus, how he said, It is more blessed to give
than to receive."

We will now transcribe the substance of Bishop Wilson's
remarks :

" It is to me, I confess, a matter of surprise and shame,
that in the nineteenth century we should really have the fun-
damental position of the whole system of Popery virtually re-
asserted in the bosom of that very Church which was reformed
so determinately three centuries since from this self-same
evil, by the doctrine and labours and martyrdom of Cranmer
and his noble fellow-sufferers.

" What ! are we to have all the fond tenets which formerly
sprung from the traditions of men reintroduced, in however
modified a form, amongst us ? Are we to have a refined tran-
substantiation—the sacraments, and not faith, the chief means
of salvation—a confused and uncertain mixture of the merits
of Christ and inherent grace in the matter of justification—
remission of sins, and the new creation of Christ Jesus, con-
fined, or almost confined, to Baptism—perpetual doubt of
pardon to the penitent after that sacrament—the duty and ad-
vantage of self-imposed austerities—the innocency of prayers
for the dead—and similar tenets and usages which generate
a spirit of bondage'—again asserted amongst us ? And is
the paramount authority of the inspired Scriptures, and the
doctrine of the grace of God in our justification by the alone
merits of Jesus Christ which reposes on that authority, to be
again weakened and obscured by such human superadditions ;
and a new edifice of will-worship,' and ' voluntary humility,'
and the rudiments of the world,' as the Apostle speaks, to
be erected once more in the place of the simple Gospel of a
crucified Saviour ?

" My language is strong, my Reverend Brethren, but I
think you will agree with me that it is not too strong for the
occasion. You shall judge for yourselves. I select as a spe-
cimen of the whole system, and what forms its basis, so far
as I can understand it from the various publications which
have reached me, the following passage from the able, learned,
and accomplished author of the Sermon on Tradition—for it
is not necessary to disparage, in the slightest degree, the high
endowments of the leaders in this new way.
" With relation to the Supreme authority of inspired
Scripture,' says the Professor of Poetry (Mr. Keble,) it
stands thus—Catholic tradition teaches revealed truth, Scrip-
ture proves it ; Scripture is the document of faith, Tradition
the witness of it ; the true creed is the Catholic interpretation
of Scripture, or scripturally proved Tradition ; Scripture by
itself teaches mediately, and proves decisively ; Scripture and
Tradition taken separately together are the joint rule of
faith.' "

" So then Tradition is the primary, and Holy Scripture the
secondary, teacher of Divine truth—so then we are to search
the inspired Word of God, not as the one authoritative ade-
quate rule of faith, but as the document of what this Tradi-
tion teaches—we are to study the Scriptures, not in order to
ascertain simply God's revealed will, but to prove Tradition
by scriptural evidence—and the standard of revelation is no
longer the Bible alone, that is, the inspired Word of the Eter-
nal God in its plain and obvious meaning, but Scripture and
Tradition taken together are the joint rule of faith.
" All this is surely sufficiently alaaming ; but it becomes in-
comparably more so, when we learn with what latitude the
word Tradition is understood. It includes, as we gather from
the other repeated statements of the learned author, unwrit-
ten as well as written' traditions, ' certain remains or frag-
ments of the treasure of Apostolical doctrines and Church
rules ' in other words, an oral law, independent of, and dis-
tinct from the truths which arc directly scriptural;' which
traditions are to be received apart from all Scripture evi-
dence, as traditionary or common laws ecclesiastical.' Sc.
that it appears that Scripture, and unwritten as well as writ-
ten Tradition, are, taken together, the joint rule of faith.
" I appeal to you, Reverend Brethren, whether we have
not here a totally false principle asserted as to the Rule of
Faith. I appeal to you, whether the very reading of this
statement is not enough to condemn it. I appeal to you,
whether the blessed and all-perfect Book of God is not thus
depressed into a kind of attendant and expositor of Tradition.
I appeal to you, whether this is not to magnify the comments
of men above the inspired words of the Holy Ghost. I ap-
peal to you, whether this is riot to make Tradition an integral
part of the canon of faith, and so to undermine the whole fa-
bric of the Reformation, or rather of 'the glorious Gospel of
the blessed God,' which that Reformation vindicated and
affirmed. _ _ _ _

" I am as far as possible from supposing, that the various
pious and learned authors, to whose sentiments, and especi-
ally one of them, lam alluding, have any such intention. I
am sure they have not. But the tendency of the system is
not in my view the less dangerous. Such will and must be,
I think, the general effect of its diffusion amongst a multitude
of young divinity students, with comparatively little experi-
ence, and too apt to follow the new theories of popular and
distinguished persons.
" And wherefore this deviation from our old Protestant
doctrine and language ; why this false principle ; why this
new school, as it were, of Divinity ? Ancient testimony in
its proper place, who had undervalued ? The dignity and
grace of the Sacraments, who had denied ? The study of pri-
mitive antiquity, who had renounced? The witness of the
early Fathers, who had disparaged ? Wherefore weaken,
then, by pushing beyond its due bearing the argument which
all writers of credit in our Church had delighted to acknow-
ledge ? The testimony of the Apostolical and primitive ages,
for example, to the genuineness, authenticity, and Divine in-
spiration of the Canonical Books of the New Testament, as
of the Jewish Church to those of the Old, who had called in
question ? Or who had doubted the incalculable importance
of the witness of the universal ancient Church at the Council
of Nice to the broad fact of the faith of the whole Christian
world, from the days of the Apostles to that hour, in the mys-
ter.es of the adorable Trinity and of the Incarnation, as there
rehearsed and recognized ? Or who had called in question
the other matters of fact which are strengthened by Christian
antiquity—as the Divine authority and perpetual obligation
of the Lord's Day—the institution and perpetuity of the two,
and only two Christian Sacraments—the right of the infants
of the faithful to the blessings of Holy Baptism—the Aposto-
lical usage of Confirmation—the permanent separation of a
body of men for sacred services—the duty of willing rever-
ence from the people for them—the threefold rank of Mi-
nisters in Christ's Church—the use of Liturgies—the obser-
vation of the festivals of our Lord's birth, resurrection, as-
cension, and gift of the Holy Ghost—with similar points ; to
which may be added, their important negative testimony to
the non-existence of any one of the peculiar doctrines and
claims of the modern Court and Church of Rome ? These
and similar facts we rejoice to acknowledge, as fortified by
pure and nncorrupted primitive tradition or testimony.
" We rejoice also to receive, with our own Protestant Re.
formed Church, the universal witness of the Catholic Fathers
and ancient Bishops, expressed in the three Creeds, as a most
important method of guarding the words of Revelation from
the artful ambiguities of heretics, and as rules and terms of