7. So much on our controversy with the "Month." But there is one particular on which we unhesitatingly take to ourselves blame. The "Month" considers, that certain portions of Dr. Gillow's letter which appeared in our October number had some appearance of charging that periodical with consciously stating what was not true. We know, as a matter of fact, that nothing could be further from Dr. Gillow's intention; and we must add that, in our humble judgment, no such charge is conveyed in the legitimate objective sense of Dr. Gillow's words. But we cannot help seeing that it is possible for some readers so to misunderstand one or two sentences. We cannot express too strongly our feeling, on the extreme importance of avoiding in controversy, especially in Catholic controversy, whatever could possibly give such an impression. We much regret therefore, that we did not observe the possibility of such misapprehension, and point it out to Dr. Gillow. It constantly happens that an external observer sees more accurately the possible effect of some expression, than does the writer himself: and we are quite certain that, when he wrote the letter, the possibility never occurred to Dr. Gillow of his being so misapprehended.

The Carlow College Magazine, Nov., 1869.

Carlow: Fitzsimons.

TH HE very able philosophical writer in this magazine is still of opinion, that his words concerning ontologism do not in their legitimate objective sense justify the interpretation which we gave them. He has not yet completed his argument, and we defer its careful consideration until he has done so. Here we will only say, that we shall examine his remarks with the utmost care; and that no false shame shall prevent our admitting ourselves to have been in the wrong, should it so appear.

We are greatly indebted to him for the kind feeling evinced in his very undeserved eulogy of ourselves. Indeed, we have of late been much consoled by finding, in various quite unconnected quarters, a very handsome appreciation of our humble labours in the good cause.

(Note to p. 494 of our last volume.)

We find with much regret that the first paragraph of our notice of Dr. Redmond's Sermon-essays has been understood as intended in an unfriendly sense towards S. Edmund's. Certainly it would be peculiarly ungraceful, for more reasons than one, in the editor of this Review to insert any unfriendly mention of a College, with which he has been intimately connected, VOL. XIV.—NO. XXVII. [New Series.]

X

and for whose superiors he entertains the most cordial feelings of respect and regard. We admit that our words were open to misconception; yet when we exhibit the connection of our thought, they will be seen to run most naturally. We were explaining how it was, that so accomplished a theologian as Dr. Redmond had given up his theological class. S. Edmund's, we said, "is no longer more than a 'petit seminaire""; consequently no theology is taught there; and for that reason "Dr. Redmond's theological labours have been brought to an end in the natural course of things." Our own conviction is, that S. Edmund's is a great gainer by the removal of its theological students: but this is not the place for discussing such a theme.

THE

DUBLIN REVIEW.

APRIL, 1870.

ART. I.-JANUS AND FALSE BRETHREN. The Pope and the Council. By JANUS. Translated from the German. London, Oxford, and Cambridge: Rivingtons. 1869.

N our last number we expressed ourselves strongly on the un

say, that 420 pages out of its 425 are purely destructive; are occupied, as has been said, with "bringing accusations of fraud, forgery, ambition, oppression, corrupt teaching in faith and morals, and other charges, against many of the most distinguished Popes, saints, theologians, and ecclesiastical writers."* His readers however desire to know, not what opinions he holds in common with deists and atheists, but what doctrines he embraces as a professing Catholic in particular they desire to know, what is his precise view on the Church's unity and infallibility.

His volume, taken as it stands, conveys these two propositions : (1) that corporate unity is no essential characteristic of the Church; and (2) that infallibility resides, not in Pope and bishops, but in the body of the faithful. The former of these two propositions is stated a good deal more clearly and expressly than the latter; and indeed no one, merely by reading the passage to which we refer, could have a moment's doubt on its meaning. There has been, says Janus," since the ninth century," "a transformation" "of the Primacy into the Papacy,

*This quotation is from F. Keogh's "Specimens of Scientific History from Janus." We received this pamphlet just in time for our last number's notice but we would once more earnestly press it on our readers' attention. There is a very important distinction, between works depending for their value on argument, and those depending for their value on alleged facts. If 999 arguments out of 1,000 are bad, the reader can none the less judge the thousandth on its own merits: but if a writer bases his case on alleged facts, and his readers find that an indefinite number of these are gross mis-statements, they can place no reasonable confidence in any one of the rest, until they have themselves examined its evidence. This is the invaluable service which F. Keogh has performed, in regard to those unprincipled writers who have published under the name of "Janus."

VOL. XIV.—NO. XXVIII. [New Series.]

Y

the consequences of which have been the splitting up of the previously united Church into three great ecclesiastical bodies, divided and at enmity with each other. The ancient Church found the need of a centre of unity, of a bishop possessed of primatial authority, to whom the oppressed might turn, and by whose powerful intercession they might obtain justice. But when the presidency in the Church became an empire, when in place of the first bishop deliberating and deciding in union with his "brethren on the affairs of the Church, and setting them the example of submission to her laws, was substituted the despotic rule of an absolute monarch, then the unity of the Church, so firmly secured before, was broken up (p. xxii).

No one, we have said, by merely reading this passage, could have the slightest doubt of its meaning. Janus throughout uses the word Church" in its ordinary sense, as the society founded by Christ. He had just before said that "the Church from the first was founded on the Primacy." In the passage we have cited he adds that "the ancient Church" needed "a centre of unity"; that Popes accordingly possessed "a presidency in the Church"; that they deliberated with their fellow-bishops, "on the affairs of the Church." Concerning "the Church," so understood, he expressly affirms, that at some period since the ninth century her "unity, so firmly secured before, was broken up," and that "the previously united Church" was "split up into three great ecclesiastical bodies divided and at enmity with each other."

Of all the doctrinal statements in Janus's volume, this was about the most clearly and unmistakably expressed; and our surprise therefore may be imagined, when a letter appeared from Mr. Oxenham in the Catholic papers repudiating our interpretation. This letter may rank among the curiosities of literature; and we should be sorry therefore not to give our readers the benefit of its argumentative portion. The italics are Mr. Oxenham's.

SIR, My attention has been called to an attack on myself in the current number of the "Dublin Review," in an article on "Janus" (p. 215), which contains two deliberate misstatements, and something very like a third, in the space of two lines.

Referring to a paper of mine in the "Academy" for October, the reviewer says: "Mr. Oxenham comes before the public as sponsor for a work which openly denies the Church's corporate unity, and counts Anglicans and Photians as her members."

1. It is not usual, I apprehend, to speak of the writer of even a favourable review as making himself "sponsor" for the whole work reviewed and every statement contained in it, unless he expressly says so. Very few reviewers probably would choose to be held responsible for every line of a volume of several hundred pages. In this case, moreover, I distinctly stated that I was "analyzing rather than criticising the work" of "Janus," and of course I made no reference to either of the statements fathered upon him by the "Dublin"-for a very sufficient reason.

2. For, secondly, and still more, neither of those statements is anywhere made by Janus, directly or indirectly; and I doubt if there is a single living

writer, except the editor of the "Dublin," who would have contrived to extract such a meaning out of the very simple passage he has exclusively relied on for the purpose. Janus" speaks (Pref., p. xxii. Eng. Trans.) of "the splitting up of the previously united Church into three great ecclesiastical bodies, divided and at enmity with each other." This is a bare assertion of a notorious historical fact, and has nothing whatever to do with the doctrinal question of "the Church's corporate unity," or the claims of either the Greek Church (which I suppose is intended by the nickname of "Photians") or the Anglican to form a part of it-questions lying wholly beyond the scope of the writer's argument. It is a simple fact that "the previously united Church" was split up," first by the separation of the Easterns, finally consummated in the eleventh century, and next by the separation, not of "Anglicans" only (that is a gratuitous, not to say absurd gloss, which could never even have occurred to a German author), but of Protestantism en masse, i.e., all nonRoman Western Christianity.. .-I am, Sir, your obedient servant,

Jan. 11, 1870.

H. N. OXENHAM.

We have omitted the concluding paragraph which is not argumentative, not because it could do us any kind of injury, but for a different reason altogether. Mr. Oxenham quotes certain expressions to the disparagement of our controversial fairness we must be allowed to think ill-advised expressions-put forth by a distinguished Catholic writer; and for this writer we feel such sincere respect, that we could not bear to involve him for a single moment in any kind of even apparent solidarity with Mr. Oxenham.

On reading Mr. Oxenham's letter, our contributor addressed a reply to the Catholic papers, fully accepting of course Mr. Oxenham's explanation as to his own meaning: but expressing himself as slow to believe, that Janus could be so utterly imbecile in thought as Mr. Oxenham supposes; that Janus could have failed to mean what he so plainly said. Mr. Oxenham however, in rejoinder, referred to p. xxvii, in which Janus contrasts "the Catholic Church with "the religious communities separated from her," and presently includes "the Eastern Church" under this latter category. Janus then, it would appear, has contradicted himself point-blank, in two passages only five pages distant from each other. Under these circumstances we willingly give him the benefit of the doubt; and that the rather, because the opinion which we had ascribed to him was the most violently anti-Catholic of all those advocated even by him.

But what an exhibition of his intellectual character is thus presented! Janus then, it would appear, used the phrase "the Church" as comprehending modern Quakers and Socinians; as signifying in fact the aggregate of all persons who call themselves followers of Christ. Yet he says that, during the first nine centuries, the Church's "unity" had been "firmly secured," and that the Pope possessed "a presidency in the Church." It is Janus's representation of history then, that Arians, Pelagians, Nestorians, Eutychians, and Monothelites were all "securely united" with Catholics; that