Chapter 5
CONFUTATION OF CHURCH OF ENGLANDISM AND CORRECT EXPOSITION OF THE CATHOLIC FAITH ON ALL POINTS OF CONTROVERSY BETWEEN THE TWO CHURCHES BY ALEXANDER WHITE 1st Chapter Collection 8 For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org.
Chapter 1 Moved by the grace of God, I now enter on the confutation of that schism in which, alas, I lived for many years. I lived in it, it is true, not so much of my own choice as owing to the effects of a corrupt education. For educated in schism from my infancy, I embraced error instead of truth, a sect instead of a church. Yet I adore the bounty of divine providence in affording me
liberal education. For by means of the education which I received, and the assistance of the grace and blessing of God, not only was I restrained from the commission of many wicked crimes into which others plunged, but also the gloom of ignorance being dispelled, my mind was gradually prepared for embracing the true Catholic faith. After the nefarious regicide of Charles I, King of Great Britain, to whose party I had always attached myself, I quitted the kingdom,
and during my sojourn abroad began seriously to reflect on the great and manifold perils from which, through the mercy of God, I had already escaped. These considerations led me to think on the vanity, the uncertainty, the brief and fleeting duration of earthly joys and possessions, and the idle pursuit of which so much labor is expended, and so much anxiety felt by the great bulk of mankind, and whilst in this salutary frame of mind, I entered into the resolution
of using for the future greater diligence in securing true and eternal happiness than I had theretofore employed. One thing, however, caused me the greatest possible uneasiness, namely that I knew not with which church to associate myself. I believed in the existence of only one true church, but which that one was I knew not.
I did not indeed at that time doubt but that the church which the king and the bishops of his persuasion had defended, and with which I had always held communion, was a true part of the church. But I could not find such a church out of my own country. I thought it possible that the church might never be restored, but it appeared to me most absurd to say the universal church should perish with it. I vehemently desired to find the truth, but my mind fluctuated as to the
mode of arriving at it. I supplicated Almighty God to grant me His assistance in this important affair, and pondered in my mind many considerations regarding it. But for the space of several months I was unable to arrive at any fixed conclusion. At length, after the most serious consideration, and after gravely and repeatedly reflecting on various plans, my mind became impressed with the absolute necessity of adopting the following, namely, that I should consult the fathers and
doctors of the primitive church, of whose fidelity and piety I could entertain no doubt, and who, because they flourished at a period so remote from our contentious times, I concluded were wholly free from party zeal, and should on that account be deemed impartial witnesses. I determined, therefore, to devote some years to this study, firmly resolved on embracing the doctrine of faith handed down by them, and on joining communion with whatever
church I should find teaching the same doctrine at the present day. After a course of reading which occupied seven years, and which by the grace of God I concluded with great delight, but with still greater fruit and advantage, I carefully read over the notes that I had choicely extracted during my previous course of study. Then on comparing the doctrine of faith handed down by the primitive Catholic Church with that of the Church of England, to which I had
before belonged, I found the former in many points at open variance with the latter, but discovered it to be the very same as that which the Roman Catholic Church teaches and promulgates at the present day. Wherefore I was at the same time affected with sorrow and joy, with sorrow because I had so long lived in schism, with joy that I should at length, by the divine mercy and grace, be freed from it. I immediately fled from schism, and of my own accord presented myself as a
suppliant, suing for peace from the church, and this I obtained according to the usual form of reconciliation. Now that I have obtained my own reconciliation, I am induced to publish this treatise, for two reasons especially, one of which regards myself, the other my neighbour. One regards myself, for whilst I publicly refute the English schism, I also publicly declare myself to have been formerly ignorant and foolish. I lament indeed that I should have lived so long
in ignorance and folly, yet I am not ashamed to confess it publicly, knowing that the more emphatically I declare my own misery and iniquity, the more do I magnify in my own particular instance the mercy and grace of God. Sorrow for sins committed and a public confession of them avail much to the penitent, but the ruinous and deadly false shame of confessing sins weighs the sinner down to hell. St. Augustine severely rebukes this false shame in the
schismatic Vincentius. Why, he asks him, do you still hesitate to profess what you believe, unless because you are confounded at having formerly believed or defended a doctrine which you do not now believe? And whilst you are ashamed to confess your error, why are you not ashamed to persevere in error, which certainly is a thing far more shameful? This is a subject on which the scripture also is far from being silent. There is a confusion leading to sin, and there
is a confusion leading to grace and glory. Confusion leads to sin, when a man is ashamed to change an erroneous opinion, lest he be deemed inconsistent, or lest, upon his own showing, he be pronounced to have remained long in error. Thus do they go down alive into hell. alive. That means conscious that they are the authors of their own perdition, and that there would be persons of this description was long ago foreshown in the case of Cor, Dathan, and
Aberon, who were swallowed up in an opening of the earth. But confusion leads to grace and glory, when a man blushes at his own iniquity, does penance, and amends his life, which it grieveth you, who are wholly under the influence of that pernicious shame. To do, lest men who know not the meaning of the words should object against you, the following verse of St. Paul, If I build up again the things I have destroyed, I make myself a prevaricator.
But if these words could be urged against men who, when converted, proclaim the truth which, while perverse, they assailed, they could then be advanced against St. Paul himself, in whom the churches of Christ magnified God, on hearing that he preached the faith which he had before endeavored to destroy. The other reason that incites me to write proceeds from commiseration for my neighbor. How afflicted is my soul, as often as I call to mind, that they who were the
partners of my numerous and severe trials, still persevere in the crime of schism, and are on that count wretched. Formerly I loved myself and them in the communion of schism. Wherefore it is evident that I hated not loved myself and them. For he that loveth iniquity hateth his own soul, and he that loves others in sin hates their souls. But now through means of God's grace I love myself in the communion of Catholic truth and charity, and I vehemently desire to love
them in the same communion. It is for this reason that I reprove their schism, whereby they are precluded from this communion, and I debarred of my wished-for delight. The more, says St. Augustine, vice displeases us, the less do we wish the wicked to die unamended. For it is an easy thing, and agreeable to our inclination, to hate the wicked, because they are wicked, but it is a rare and pious thing so to love them because they are men, as that you at the same time censor the
guilt and reverence the nature in the same individual. And you will hate the guilt the more justly, because the nature which you love is dishonored by it. These are the words of St. Augustine. Such a my brethren as abandoned schism and returned to the communion of the Catholic Church will also love me in that communion, but they who persevere in schism will recompense me as the Corinthians recompense St. Paul, who burn with a divine charity towards them. For when
writing to them, he says, And I most gladly will spend and be spent myself for your souls. Whereunto, he immediately adds, Although loving you more, I be loved less. Neither did he receive a better reward from the Galatians when addressing whom he thus writes, Am I then become your enemy, because I tell you the truth? My brethren may recompense me as they please, yet will I act towards them as charity prescribes. I will reprove their schism, publicly expose the heresy and other
deadly errors in which they are involved. I will exhort them to peace and communion with the Catholic Church, and I hope that some at least will yield the desired fruit, not indeed that I rely on my own weakness, but upon the virtue of Christ, who, as the apostle says, hath chosen the weak things of this world, that he may confound the strong. Wherefore St. Augustine, considering these words of the apostle, says, should a learned man be chosen, perhaps he would say he was so
chosen, because he deserved to be chosen for his learning. Our Lord Jesus Christ, wishing to humble the necks of the proud, sought not to convert the fisherman by means of the orator, but gain the emperor by means of the fisherman. Cyprian, the great orator, believed. But before him Peter the fisherman, through whom not only the orator, but the emperor too afterwards believed. No noble was at first elected, no learned man, for the weak things of the world hath God chosen, that he may
confound the strong. So far, Augustine. I add that as Christ did before, infrequently, though not always, so doth he in the present day. Relying then, not on my own strength, but on the assistance of Christ, I descend into the arena. I will reprove, as I have already said, the English schism. I will publicly expose the heresy and other deadly errors in which my brethren are implicated. I will exhort them to peace and communion with the Catholic Church.
But before so doing, I shall offer a few prefatory observations on the nature of schism and heresy, and on the morals of schismatics and heretics. End of chapter 1 of Confutation of Church of Englandism by Alexander White
