Edited by Roderick Strange
Oxford University Press, 2015.
I remember buying this book from Church House Bookshop soon after it was published in 2015. I was all enthusiasm, expecting to be very spiritually uplifted by reading the letters of a spiritual man, one of the ‘fathers’ of the Oxford Movement which had brought the Church of England back to a greater recognition of tradition and sense of the sacred.
The fact that it has taken me four years to finish reading its 595 pages, indicates that I found it heavy going. I had expected every letter to be packed full of pearls of spiritual wisdom and encouragement to his correspondents, but most of them are to do with the various entanglements he has with the church authorities. Here is a well-meaning man struggling from one difficult task to another. Firstly where he is getting into trouble with the Church of England authorities by writing theological articles that are too Anglo-Catholic for their liking. And then, after he has become a Roman Catholic, struggling with the Roman Catholic authorities when he gets entangled in their bureaucracy over setting up a theological college in Ireland and a Roman Catholic mission in Oxford.
I got the picture of a hard-working man, with good motives, but rather thin skinned to perceived insults, and I didn’t feel I was in the presence of a holy saint. Though of course he would have been the first to deny any saintliness on his own part. Also, Sister Wendy Beckett in her “Book of Saints” writes, “The saints are the people, weak and imperfect like ourselves, who said a total ‘Yes’ to God’s love. It is not that they were strong enough or virtuous enough, to win his love, because that love is always freely given, but only those we call saints actually did that blessed taking; accepted the reality of being loved with all its consequences”
All his letters are courteously worded in the formal style of the time, but there is a petulant obstinacy that shows through at times, for example his letter to Henry Bittleston on 16 June1856 where he wrote that he had refused to read a letter of apology that had been sent to him because it was not an official letter from the organisation that had wronged him:
“when Fr Antony […] sent me a private explanation, I wrote him word […] that I would not read it; that I could not, and would not; that if anything was to be retracted, the body must do it.” (p.268).
But God did bring good out of his character trait of feeling the need to have his actions publicly acknowledged as just, because resulted in him writing his most famous work, his Apologia pro Vita Sua. The selector of the letters Roderick Strange writes in an introduction:
“Wrting his Apologia was for Newman both agony and relief. It was a relief at last to have the opportunity to explain himself, to show that in becoming a Catholic he had behaved honestly and honourably, but it was an agony to have to reveal his inmost thoughts and feelings. […] The result was both a literary masterpiece and a personal triumph.” (p.357-8).
In a letter to W. J. Copeland on 19 April 1864 when he is in the process of writing the book, he writes:
“you will be disappointed – it is not a history of the movement but of me – it is an egotistical matter from beginning to end. It is to prove that I did not act dishonestly […] In writing I kept bursting into tears.” (p.368-9)
The letters to include snippets of Newman’s views on some of the hot topics of the day. For example, on the role of Mary, his letter to John Keble of 8 October 1865:
“I never can deny my belief that the Blessed Virgin prays efficaciously for the Church, and for individual souls in and out of it. Nor can I deny that to be devout to her is a duty following on this doctrine – but I never will say, even though St Bernadine said it, that no one is saved who is not devout to her” (p.397).
Regarding Darwin’s theory of evolution, Newman writes to J. Walker on 22 May 1868 about a book that had criticised Darwin:
“I do not fear the theory so much as he seems to do – and it seems to me that he is hard upon Darwin sometimes, which he might have interpreted him kindly. It does not seem to me to follow that creation is denied because the Creator, millions of years ago, gave laws to matter. He first created matter and then he created laws for it – laws which should construct it into its present wonderful beauty, and accurate adjustment and harmony of parts gradually. We do not deny or circumscribe the Creator, because we hold he has created the self acting originating human mind, which has almost a creative gift; much less then do we deny or circumscribe His power, if we hold that He gave matter such laws as by their blind instrumentality moulded and constructed through innumerable ages the world as we see it. […] Mr Darwin’s theory need not then be atheistical, be it true or not; it may simply be suggesting a larger idea of Divine Prescience and Skill.” (p.431).
He writes during the time of the First Vatican Council that pronounces on the doctrine of papal infallibility. Before the Council, Newman writes to Mrs Froude on 21 November 1869 that it would be unwise to make such a doctrinal pronouncement.
“it brings up a great variety of questions about past acts of Popes – whether their decrees in past ages are infallible, or whether they are not, and which of them, and therefore whether they are binding on us.
If any thing could throw religion into confusion, make sceptics, encourage scoffers, and throw back inquirers, it will be the definition of this doctrine.” (p.437)
Then after the Vatican Council proclaimed the doctrine of papal infallibility, Newman as a faithful Roman Catholic supported the doctrine, putting the best impression on it. For example in the letter to Richard Littledale 17 September 1872 (p.459) and the letter to Isy Froude 28 July 1875 (p.478).
The human and holy side of Newman does sometimes come out in his letters. For example, his letter to Miss Hope-Scott on 30 April 1873 following the death of her father:
“My dear Child
You alone can know what it is to be bereaved of such a Father. You never can have a heavier blow, because you are so young and so untried in suffering. But God is more than enough to make up all to you, and He will. You will look back with tender affection, not only on happy past days, but on this long sad time, when hope rose and fell again, and you felt weary of the changes.
May you be as great a blessing to all around you, as he has been.
For me, his departure is a memento that my day must come. May I be as well prepared as he.
[…] I shall say many Masses for him […] not excluding you and your need of strength and consolation.
This of course requires no answer.
Ever yours affectionately John H Newman.” (p.464).
and writing to twins Helen and Mary Church on 21 February 1878 on their birthday:
“My dear Helen and Mary,
How shall I best show kindness to you on your birthday?
It is by wishing and praying that year by year you may grow more and more in God’s favour and in inward peace, – in an equanimity and cheerfulness under all circumstances which is the fruit of faith, and a devotion which finds no duties difficult, for it is inspired by love.
This I do with all my heart, & am, My dear Children very affectionately yours,
John H. Newman” (p.491)
and writing to Lord Braye on 29 October 1882, who had recently become a Catholic:
“Doubt not that He will use you – be brave – have faith in His love for you – His everlasting love – and love Him from the certainty that He loves you.” (p.538).
and to a keen young Christian, Emily Fortey on 3 October 1884:
“You must not suppose that your present state of peace and joy will always continue. It is God’s mercy to bring us over difficulties. As time goes on, you may be cast down to find that your warmth of feeling does not last as it once was, and instead of it you may have trials of various kinds. Never mind; be brave; make acts of faith, hope, and charity; put yourself into God’s hands, and thank Him for all that he sends you, pleasant or painful. The Psalms and Saint Paul’s Epistles will be your great and abiding consolation.” (p.546).
The book is only a selection of Newman’s letters. I wish that the Editor had selected more of the letters that had these snippets of wisdom, and fewer of the letters, which while of interest to the historian, are of less interest to the reader after spiritual wisdom.
Adrian Vincent,
April 2019.