Newman Reader - The Press on Cardinal Newman

Musical World

{169} To speak of the loss which the Church of Rome has sustained by the death of Cardinal NEWMAN would obviously be foreign to the scope of this journal. Still less is it our province to refer to that epoch in the history of the English Church in which he played so large a part. But we may not unfitly join in the expression of universal sorrow which follows the removal of one who, distinguished as an artist, was still more nobly distinguished as a thinker of singular elevation and acuteness, and a man of the noblest and purest character. Even the few who care for none of the things to which Cardinal NEWMAN'S life was devoted were sensible of his influence. They revered his purity and gentleness and noble enthusiasm—qualities independent of creed: and his example was not least potent with those who could never find help or inspiration at the sources whence he drew both. We have said that as an artist in verse the dead Prince of the Catholic Church is entitled to lasting memory, for the skilled touch, the graceful or deep thought were never wanting from his poems, of which the "Dream of Gerontius" is certainly the best. As a master of English style he was not less remarkable, for in his hands our language was always a thing of consummate beauty, even when he used it as a keen weapon of controversy; and the "Apologia" remains one of the most fascinating and helpful "human documents" in our possession. But of more inestimable value than all is the influence of a faith so courageous, a purpose so high and unswerving, a purity of thought so stainless. {170}

Newcastle Daily Leader

Yesterday the last tribute of honour and affection was paid to the most distinguished English Catholic of the nineteenth century. That title at least belonged to JOHN HENRY NEWMAN, and, whatever our point of view, we must admit that it was no mean one. Much has recently been said about him, and much remains to be said. A man's place in the world's history is not assigned to him in the first moments of obituary regret, and there are a great many reasons why a final estimate of Cardinal NEWMAN is at present impossible. To be judged rightly—to borrow a phrase from the maxims of jurisprudence—the thinker must be judged by his peers, and from the point of view, as we all ought to be able to admit, the peers of NEWMAN are to be found within the limits of his own Church. This truth may be unpopular, but it is none the less sound. It was a Catholic and a Cardinal who was buried yesterday—not a man of letters, not an eminent "genius," not a philosopher, not simply a famous Englishman. We do not reckon him, and we ought not to reckon him, with a Carlyle, a Ruskin, a Matthew Arnold, for he had not the splendid self-assertion of the modern literary hero, but was distinguished amongst all his contemporaries by his subordination of genius to belief. We do [not] know what NEWMAN would have been or done if he had not become a Catholic, but at least he would not have possessed this peculiar distinction. He possessed it; and while he has many and great claims to remembrance, it is this that makes him in a special sense a type of his century. JOHN HENRY NEWMAN, however, was a man of genius, who in a century of new things moved deliberately towards the old. It is clear that he felt with his world—that he knew its troubles, that he saw its tendencies, that he looked out upon the great sea of modern conflict and recognised all the perils of the voyage. He did not quit Anglicanism for a vestment, or surrender to the mere charms of tradition. {171} He understood the deeper meaning of the problem, and whether he chose wrongly or rightly, he chose with all his genius, and knowing all the consequences of his choice. It is this—and neither the charm of his literary style nor the solemn beauty of his personal life—that will cause him to he remembered and studied. He was truly a representative man of his age—not standing for himself only, but for a movement which cannot yet be measured, and for forces which are amongst the vital influences of human evolution.

Newcastle Weekly Chronicle

The death of Cardinal NEWMAN has touched the heart of England. Indeed, beyond his island home, wherever the tongue of which he was so consummate a master is spoken, JOHN HENRY NEWMAN is mourned. A great French writer has said that to know a man thoroughly we must know his ancestry. Enough has been revealed on that point to enable us to understand the great Cardinal. From the beginning to the end of his career, he was perfectly transparent. "The eye was single, and the whole body was full of light." His Eminence belonged to a remarkable family. It is, however, only with two of the six of which it was made up, that the world is familiar. Both of them have furnished the world with autobiographic sketches. The "Apologia Pro Vita Sua" of the elder brother is one of the most fascinating books of the century; and if "Phases of Faith" has not the same attraction, its lack of power must be sought in a lack of reverence. JOHN HENRY NEWMAN and Francis William Newman were trained in the same school. In early life, under the tuition of a mother of Huguenot extraction and of great personal accomplishments, they imbibed the Calvinism in which she had been reared. In his poetical works the Cardinal has preserved "A Birthday {172} Offering" to the brother who has survived him. The offering is a hearty recognition of his success, "ere age had dimm'd his sun-lit heaven," and was written in the summer of 1826. The volume in which it appears was given to the world in 1867. Long before that date, Francis William Newman had developed all his peculiarities. It was a noble trait in the character of the Cardinal that he never allowed theological differences to becloud sympathy for friends. It was one of the peculiarities of this remarkable man that he had a faculty for making distinctions so subtle as almost to impose upon himself. Men with intellectual power not so keen pronounced him insincere; but that was an altogether mistaken view of one of the most ingenuous of men. His character was throughout thoroughly English, and in his works he has given unmistakable evidence that he preferred the directness of his countrymen to Italian finesse, especially when it ventured to apply the abating process to ethics. There can, however, be no doubt that the Cardinal had become thoroughly imbued with the creed of Catholicism at a comparatively early period of his career as a Roman ecclesiastic. The "Dream of Gerontius" furnishes conclusive evidence of that fact. Until the publication of that remarkable poem never was the doctrine of Purgatory presented in a form so fascinating. The weird sublimity of this dream is something to be for ever remembered.

But it is not as the representative of any particular Church that Cardinal NEWMAN is honoured by Englishmen. The entrance of this great thinker, and of another almost equally gifted, into the fold of Rome, were events not to be forgotten. But, despite temporary estrangement, Englishmen love to think of NEWMAN and Manning as eminent English scholars and theologians. For many a day, St. Mary's, Oxford, was NEWMAN'S throne. The discourses he delivered there are among the finest things in the language. To a cultured audience the intellectual pleasure and ethical profit received from his discourses was immense. The few now {173} surviving who, either in Oxford or at Edgbaston, heard the Cardinal discourse were peculiarly privileged. There was nothing of the Boanerges about NEWMAN. He did not belong to the class of preachers Burns describes as clearing "the points o' faith with rattling and with thumping." But his quiet undertone could not veil the rich intellectual and spiritual treasures to which his audiences were treated. Possibly there are still in Oxford those who regret that they preferred a hot dinner to NEWMAN'S sermons. Here is a sample of the public analysis which they thus lost. The "Book of Ruth" has been often discoursed upon, but never before was the contrast between Ruth and Orpah put so vividly:—"Orpah kissed her mother-in-law, but Ruth clave unto her. Orpah kissed Naomi, and went back to the world. There was sorrow in the parting, but Naomi's sorrow was more for Orpah's sake than for her own. Pain there would be; but it was the pain of a wound, not the yearning regret of love. It was the pain we feel when friends disappoint us and fall in our esteem. That kiss of Orpah was no loving token; it was but the hollow profession of those who use smooth words, that they may part company with us with the least trouble and discomfort to themselves. Orpah's tears were the dregs of affection; she clasped her mother-in-law that she might not cleave to her." It is the deep human interest which they possess that gives Cardinal NEWMAN'S sermons their abiding power. They abound in passages akin to that reproduced. Oxford, England, Europe, and America had in him a great ethical teacher. England is rich in theologians. At this moment illustrious names come back upon us—Hooker, whose "Ecclesiastical Polity" is a monumental work; Butler, whose "Analogy" is not for an age, but for all time; Cudworth, whose "Intellectual System of the Universe" is even now a marvel of erudition and reasoning. Wichcote's frequent aphoristic utterances keep his memory green, and Jeremy Taylor is the Shakspeare of the English Church. It is with these lords of {174} thought that JOHN HENRY NEWMAN takes rank. The Roman purple was never worn by one more worthy. But he needed no earthly dignity to give him greatness. NEWMAN was a prince of the Church, who "held the patent of his nobility immediately from Almighty God."

Newcastle Evening Chronicle

The departed Cardinal has, as the fruit of his busy life, left behind him a vast storehouse of literary matter, which, whether for the depth of its thought, or for the clear and masterly English in which it is clothed, will be resorted to by studious and reflective minds for many a day. Whatever Dr. NEWMAN undertook to do, he has done to the very uttermost. Intellectually, morally, controversially, and theologically, he has made his mark upon his generation; and his writings will remain among the best and most cherished possessions of English literature.

Newcastle Journal

Of no man, perhaps, can it be said with more propriety than of the late Cardinal NEWMAN that he might have confidently left his life, had he never written the "Apologia pro Vita sua," to give the lie to his traducers and calumniators. Acres of leading articles, recapitulating the chief incidents of his career, will leave the life and work of JOHN HENRY NEWMAN, whether they are laudatory or the reverse, very much as they found both in the opinion of the public. A just estimate of such a man cannot be expected from his contemporaries, and will probably be arrived at only when his name has, through the lapse of time, been gradually detached from {175} the controversies of his age. It is beyond a doubt to NEWMAN the Anglican Church owes much of its present widespread usefulness, and its increasing hold upon the great masses of our population. The deep devotional spirit, the peaceful, loving disposition, the earnestness and sincerity, never doubted by his sharpest critics, all breathed in hymn, tract, and essay, were still more exemplified by this wearer pre-eminently of "The white flower of a blameless life." But the very virtues and graces of NEWMAN were such as tended naturally, from the time that he "fell under the influence of definite creed," to make him just precisely what he became. If ever a man grew and developed—as contra-distinguished from the mere restlessness of change and whim—that man was JOHN HENRY NEWMAN, and his whole life is, in fact, a full blown flower, of which his heart and mind must have contained the hidden germ in the earliest experiences of his youth. His life is not one to be wrangled over by warring theologians. Like his pure and graceful writing, it will, irrespective of creeds and styles, of schools and developments of opinion, be probably as much appreciated and as widely influential in future years as the hymn he composed in circumstances so touching and true to all human aspirations in doubt and sorrow after the "Kindly light" every man that cometh into the world.

News, Catholic

His death has been no unworthy end to his life. Looking back over the long years of his career, how proud we feel of him as page after page unfolds and tells of unwearying toil and unblemished honour. From youth to ripe manhood we see him struggling, bravely and honestly, to free himself from the chains of doubt and difficulty in which he found himself. What a {176} clash and a clang there was as he flung the fetters down, and how Christendom re-echoed with the noise! How many noble souls followed where he led, and with what new energy did the Church in England turn to the field before her. We see him, then, the champion of the Faith, breaking many a lance against the enemies of Truth, and by the very stature of his intellect compelling the admiration and respect of his adversaries. The Vicar of Christ upon earth raises him to the highest possible honour—that of a Prince of the Church—and the Catholic world lifts up its voice in heartfelt delight. * * * * * O, saintly life, O pure and holy death! Around his bier rises not merely the lament of his bereaved children but that also of his countrymen who are still in the darkness from which he strove to free them. He strove—but who shall say his work is ended yet or that the harvest of his labours is yet all gathered in. Men say, and say with truth, that years have passed since any event has so stirred the public heart as the death of JOHN HENRY NEWMAN has done. His name is on every lip; the story of his life and its meaning are thrilling at this moment every thinking mind which the news of his death has reached. It may be—and God grant it—that the memories and the thoughts now kindled may be to many the means of opening their eyes to the light of Faith. How vain were those who said that NEWMAN had closed his work years ago, that he could do more on earth for the Catholic Church; they forgot that he could die, and that by his death no less than by his life he could gain a victory for that Church.

We who have loved him in life must not forget him in death. The sweet incense of prayer, the solemn requiem of the Church, must ascend to Heaven for his soul. And if we desire to build up a lasting monument to his honour, let us remember that we can do it in no better way than by carrying on the work which was so dear to him. His love for his native country was intense, and it was never truer, or stronger, or steadier than when he was for a time {177} the best-hated man in that country. From beyond the stars he will look down with pleasure as he sees us carrying on the battle for truth—that truth which he ever set before his eyes, and which was the light "amid the encircling gloom," which ever led him on.

News of the World

One of the most profound thinkers and conscientious men the nineteenth century has produced is lost to England by the death of JOHN HENRY NEWMAN. Into the mental processes by which the clear-minded and zealous incumbent of St. Mary's Church, Oxford, became a convert to the Papacy even those who knew Newman best have never been able to completely enter;—it must rank among those mysteries of human action and principle that are insoluble; but no suggestion has ever been made that NEWMAN threw aside his allegiance to the Church in which he had received his religious training, and which for many years evidently satisfied his judgment and acute reasoning powers, for any other than "conscience' sake," and with the assurance in his own mind that the doctrines of Rome were true and just. The highest honours were before him; he had ever been loved, admired, and revered; he could command a stronger following than any theologian of his age, and yet in full possession of health and mind with his reflective faculties at their keenest he abjured Protestantism and became a member of the Romish Church. * * * * *

It was natural that after the step had been taken some amount of irritation should be mingled with the disappointment felt by those who had looked to see him occupy in a not very distant future one of the grandest and most commanding positions the Protestant Church could offer such a gifted disciple. That his defection was a severe loss has been admitted both by his friends and the communities always opposed to the theories set {178} forth in the agitation of which he was a leading spirit. Statesmen accustomed to take a worldly view of things no less than the clergy whose lives are passed within narrower bounds have alike agreed that NEWMAN'S peculiar influence over both young and old has never since been exercised by any Church of England prelate of like prominence.

The personal charm of NEWMAN has been recalled in the reminiscences abundantly forthcoming from those who knew him well at this active period of his career. One writer says, "I can never forget the first time I heard him preach in St Mary's, and the electric thrill which ran through the audience as sweetly soft and tender sentences were uttered with his divinely melodious voice. I remember an awe-struck whisper that came from a long and lean young man at my side, 'It is like the opening of Paradise.'" In the sphere of duty NEWMAN entered upon in 1852, when he took up his residence at the Edgbaston Oratory, he was as much esteemed as he had been elsewhere, and it was only on rare occasions subsequently that he showed any interest in what was passing outside its walls. When he entered the Church of Rome he had virtually done with the world. He is now mourned by all classes of Englishmen as one who led a blameless life, and to whom mean ambition could present no temptations.

Nonconformist

JOHN HENRY NEWMAN leaves behind him no figure more characteristic of the nineteenth century, or, to put it more precisely, of the Victorian period in English history. Take him for all in all, he is, perhaps, our most interesting man—not our greatest, mark, not our most important, but that one in whom the largest number of piquant, racy, in one word interesting circumstances combine. {179} The renowned controversialist, the moving preacher, the intrepid leader, the earnest religionist, the tender, subtle and eloquent poet, he offered many aspects to different observers and to variously constituted minds. And when the specific enumeration of what may be called his superficial qualities has been exhausted, we have still to take account of that humour which lurked deeply in his mind, and which he seems half-consciously perhaps, to have checked and held in reserve, as if it might mar the effect or destroy the dignity of his habitually reverential utterances. * * * * * None of NEWMAN'S personal and distinctive beliefs appear to have been held more seriously than that of the presence of angels in all regions of the material world, and very lovely are some of the things he says about the revelation of the beauty of nature made by those angel visitants. He believed in guardian angels, and that particular nations have particular angels to guard them. "Every breath of air," he said, "and ray of light and heat, every beautiful prospect, is, as it were, the skirts of their (the angels') garments, the waving of the robes of those whose faces see God." And yet who can doubt that his humour came into play when, after explaining to a friend that the guardian angels of nations might possibly have mixed and defective characters, and that their defects might become reflected in the persons and institutions of the guarded nations? he proceeded thus: "Take England, with many high virtues, and yet a low Catholicism. It seems to me that JOHN BULL is a spirit neither of heaven nor hell." Combining the religious earnestness and moral purity of a saint with the brilliancy of poetical genius and an underlying sense of humour—majestic yet picturesque—Dr. NEWMAN could not fail to be a supremely interesting personage. * * * * * He demonstrated his sincerity by leaving the Anglican Communion. And it ought to be remembered that, in thus manifesting the courage and the honour of his principles, he made great sacrifices. What was there among the dignities and emoluments of the {180} Church to which NEWMAN might not have confidently looked forward, if he had silenced his conscience, pretended that he was loyal, and remained in the Establishment? It was Mr. Kingsley's great mistake to overlook the applicability of this question to the case, and to insinuate, many years after NEWMAN had left the Church, that he was a shuffler. Had NEWMAN known how to put a face upon things—to say yes and no at the same time—he might have died Archbishop of Canterbury. Mr. Kingsley was so obviously in the wrong, that the public sentiment was unanimously against him when Dr. NEWMAN took his revenge.

When we leave the particular field of Anglican controversy, and go out into that worldwide region in which Dr. NEWMAN figures as a champion for religious truth in general, we are constrained to acknowledge that there were many drawbacks to his efficiency. It is paradox to say that he had too much genius to be trustworthy as a sure-footed, all-round, well-balanced reasoner. There was in him from the first a burning love of paradox and extravagance. He always preferred extreme views of things, and liked to state things in a startling manner. He says with manifest sympathy, as the position naturally and properly taken up by the Catholic Church, that "it were better for sun and moon to drop from heaven, for the earth to fall, and for the many millions upon it to die of starvation in extremest agony, as far as temporal affliction goes, than that one soul, I will not say should be lost, but should commit one single venial sin, should tell one wilful untruth, though it harmed no one, or steal one poor farthing without excuse." It is in a similar mood of mind—carried away in the impetuous tide of his emotion—that he avows himself a believer in modern miracles. He states his firm belief that "the relics of the saints are doing innumerable miracles" daily, and that the said saints "have raised the dead to life, crossed the seas without vessels, multiplied grain and bread, cured innumerable diseases, and stopped the operations of the laws of the universe {181} in a multitude of ways." In this invaluable "Apologia" he lays bare with entire frankness the constitution of his mind, and it appears that the whole pageantry of Nature had for him a peculiar significance, derived from a purely imaginary symbolism. Dreams had for him in great measure the reality of facts, and facts the wavering outlines of dreams. He was, at the same time, a consummate master of language, a magician in the use of words, and an expert in that logical word-fence which can give to fancies the forms of strict deduction. Need we, then, wonder that his contribution to the defence of religious truth against the infidelity of the age has not been of the highest importance?

Northampton Mercury

JOHN HENRY NEWMAN died in the odour of sanctity, and with the reverence of all men who honour fidelity to conscience, pure and lofty character, simplicity of life, and beautiful devotion to highest ideals of duty. The soul of the Tractarian movement, which convulsed the Church of England to its centre well-nigh two generations ago, he sought in the Church of Rome that certitude of religious faith which he failed to find in his own Church of England. His nature was of that order which could not find complete satisfaction in the voice of the Spirit of God to his own soul. He must have some external voice, clothed with the authority of the visible Church on earth, to speak peace to him. He found the peace which the Church of England could not give him in the bosom of the Church of Rome. He who was looked up to as a teacher by a growing section of the Church of England, who wielded a strange and powerful influence as a leader of religious thought as the Vicar of St. Mary's, Oxford, surrendered himself to the Church of Rome as a simple neophyte. Those who are not of his communion will pay their tribute of reverence to the memory of a great and good man. {182}

Norfolk Chronicle

By the death of Cardinal NEWMAN there has been removed from the religious world a remarkable figure. From the time when, at Oxford, he took a prominent part in the great Tractarian controversy which did so much to set up the claims and define the views of what was then termed the "High" Church, and is now known as the Ritualistic School of thought, JOHN HENRY NEWMAN was a man who attracted much attention, and exercised a wide and powerful influence. Without entering upon the question as to whether or nor that influence was as truly beneficial to the spiritual life of England as many believe it to have been, we may safely say it was honestly exercised. For though his personal opponents, embittered by the angry strife of sectarianism, regarded his keen and subtle arguments and peculiar views with deep aversion, there was one trait in his character which forcibly struck every dispassionate student of his life and habits—namely, his sincerity. Following out to their logical conclusion his own contentions, he at last felt impelled to abandon the exercise of private judgment in things spiritual for dogma and ritual—and thus "went over to Rome." His power as a preacher, his skill as a controversialist, and his zeal for the cause which he espoused marked him as a man of unusual ability and attainments. Unlike Pusey, he found no half-way resting-place between the "Broad" Church position and Roman Catholicism. His perspicacity and his intense earnestness combined to make him "thorough"—perhaps we should say, extreme—and his mental gifts and peculiar personal graces rendered him at once persuasive and fascinating. The regret that he exchanged what in his early life were apparently his spiritual convictions for the tenets of Rome, has been wide, deep, and will long continue. But—De motuis nil nisi bonum. Cardinal, once the Rev. JOHN HENRY NEWMAN, has gone to his rest. Let us be content with the thought that he wished to set an example which should work nothing but good. {183}

Nuttlesbury Circular

A master of irony and an overwhelming controversialist, Cardinal NEWMAN had a nature of rare tenderness, and his power over those who came personally in contact with him was almost unequalled. Mr. Froude and Mr. Gladstone have both testified to his consideration, his gentleness, and the singular and indescribable charm of his manner.

Pall Mall Gazette

By the death of Cardinal NEWMAN the Church of Rome loses one of its two great English Cardinals, the literature of England loses one of its great masters, and the world loses one of the chiefest of its saints. There is some trace of unreality perhaps in the "deep regret" expressed at Cardinal NEWMAN'S death. There will, indeed, be many tears shed over his grave, for the saintly old man was dearly loved by many friends and disciples. But to the great outside world there will seem something ideal in his end. It comes to all men once to die; but to few to live out their lives so completely, and to pass away so peacefully at the end. "For peace his soul was yearning. Now soft peace laps him round."

In the great outside world, indeed, perhaps the chief feeling this morning will be one of surprise that Cardinal NEWMAN was until yesterday still among us. It was not only that he lived to a great age: he was in his ninetieth year. But he had so completely outlived the work that first made him famous. All his companions had passed away. The Oxford movement had long returned upon itself and destroyed itself. The Church of his adoption had, indeed, received a great impetus in this country from his accession. Perhaps it has gone from strength to strength ever since that memorable day at Littlemore when, in the watches of the {184} night, NEWMAN finally embraced its faith. But its strength in these latter days, at any rate, has come from other sources and flowed into other channels than those which acknowledged NEWMAN as their fountainhead. He had personal influence—the influence of a saintly life—to the end. But the days of his great ascendency over the best heads and hearts of his day—the days of "Credo in Newmannum," belonged to nearly half a century ago. And the number of those is now thin who can still remember, with Mr. Froude, "that voice so keen, so preternaturally sweet, whose very whisper used to thrill through crowded churches, when every breath was held to hear; that calm, grey eye; those features, so stern and yet so gentle."

Is it, then, the case that NEWMAN had outlived his time? that his was a wasted force, a gracious memory rather than an abiding influence? We do not think so. Perhaps we are not yet far enough off yet to estimate aright the greatness of the man. But we cannot be wrong, we think, in attributing to him a permanent influence upon the religious and intellectual life of his country. It might seem, indeed, on a superficial survey, that the great crisis of his life—climax or catastrophe, as men will call it according to their predilections—reduced it in some sort to futility. Of his active life, one half was spent in giving the lie to the other. Of his controversial armoury, half the weapons were spent in spiking the other half. But the truth is, that NEWMAN was greater than any of his controversies. His lasting influence was moral rather than theological, and the good he did in the moral sphere was divided among both the communions. What was permanent in the Oxford Movement was its aspect as a reformation. It shook the Anglican Church out of its lethargy, and made Oxford a centre of spiritual and moral force. Fashions in religion come and go in Oxford almost with the regularity of fashions in coats and trousers. But the new Oxford Movement of today is, in its earnestness and vigour, in direct succession from the Oxford Movement {185} which was nicknamed Newmania. NEWMAN gave the Anglican Church an impetus, and the impetus did not cease because he withdrew. To the Church of Rome he gave, for a time, an intellectual impetus, and for all time a moral example. The latter gift is beyond all comparison the greater. In the intellectual field Cardinal NEWMAN seems to have felt himself that his battle had been in vain. Science, he saw, had not stopped its progress, because he had cried out against it, and free thought, he must have recognized, was infinitely more powerful at the end of his teaching and preaching than at the beginning. But there can be no gainsaying the beauty or the efficacy of his moral example. He has shown that the religious life—the life of the Saint and the Mystic is still possible in this nineteenth century. Gordon showed in the active life what NEWMAN showed in the contemplative; and it is an instructive coincidence that Gordon's favourite book should have been NEWMAN'S "Dream of Gerontius." Cardinal NEWMAN was once asked to define authoritatively exactly what shade of doctrinal meaning was implied in "Lead, kindly Light." In a letter of delicate irony, he refused. And he was right. The man was greater than any creed; and the beauty of his verse, like that of his example, is for all creeds alike.

A similar remark may be made, we think, of NEWMAN'S place in literature. It is the fashion to praise him as a consummate "stylist." But "the style is the man." The mingled simplicity and subtlety of NEWMAN'S style was the reflection of his mind; and what gives substance, and will give permanence to the matter of his discourses is their pure and lofty morality. Cardinal NEWMAN was a great writer, because he was a good man. {186}

Mr. Punch's Tribute to Cardinal Newman

"Lead, kindly Light!" From lips serene as strong,
    Chaste as melodious, on world-weary ears
    Fall, 'midst earth's chaos wild of hopes and fears,
The accents calm of spiritual song,
Striking across the tumult of the throng
    Like the still line of lustr, soft, severe,
    From the high-riding, ocean-swaying sphere
Athwart the wandering wilderness of waves,
Is there not human soul-light which so laves
    Earth's lesser spirits with its chastening beam,
    That passion's bale-fire and the lurid gleam
Of sordid selfishness know strange eclipse?
Such purging lustre his, whose eloquent lips
    Lie silent now. Great soul, great Englishman!
    Whom narrowing bounds of creed, or caste, or clan,
Exclude not from world-praise and all men's love.
Fine spirit, which the strain of ardent strife
    Warped not from its firm poise, or made to move
    From the pure pathways of the Saintly Life!

Newman, farewell! Myriads whose spirits spurn
    The limitations thou didst love so well,
    Who never knew the shades of Oriel,
Or felt their quickened spirits pulse and burn
    Beneath that eye's regard, that voice's spell, —
Myriads, world-scattered and creed-sundered, turn
    In thought to that hushed chamber's chastened gloom.
    In all great hearts there is abundant room
For memories of greatness, and high pride
In what sects cannot kill nor seas divide.
The Light hath led thee, on through honoured days
And lengthened, through wild gusts of blame and praise,
    Through doubt, and severing change, and poignant pain.
    Warfare that strains the breast and racks the brain,
At last to haven! Now no English heart
Will willingly forego unfeigned part
    In honouring thee, true master of our tongue,
    On whose word, writ or spoken, ever hung
All English ears which knew that tongue's best charm.
Not as great cardinal such hearts most warm
    To one above all office and all state,
    Serenely wise, magnanimously great;
Not as the pride of Oriel, or the star
Of this host or of that in creed's hot war,
    But as the noble spirit, stately, sweet,
    Ardent for good without fanatic heat, {187}
Gentle of soul, though greatly militant,
Saintly, yet with no touch of cloistral cant;
    Him England honours, and so bends today
    In reverent grief o'er Newman's glorious clay.

Record

It is not possible, even if this were the moment to attempt it, to sum up and criticise the extraordinary career which has just closed. NEWMAN'S individuality was so unique, so obviously unlike that of anybody else in this age, and his history was also so unlike the common lot of men, that the biographer may well feel bewildered when he tries to gather together the threads of the story. Bred in the healthy atmosphere of English middle-class life in the opening decades of the present century; thrown first among earnest Evangelicals whose spirit took a lifelong hold, although much of their teaching, for a time absorbed by a wonderfully elastic nature, was afterwards discarded; caught next by the University enthusiasm which fired Oxford in the golden days of Oriel under Copleston; then turned by Keble and Hurrell Froude to the congenial enterprise of reviving the English Church by asserting afresh the claims of "Catholic antiquity"; and finally swept into the Church of Rome by an over-mastering consciousness that what he was doing and teaching was loyally impossible in the Church of England. From first to last a great man, ever to the front of any work he took in hand, not because he wanted to be, but by reason of his inevitable pre-eminence: NEWMAN stands alone in the history of modern religious thought.

As a personage, probably no Englishman in the present century has excited more wide and lasting interest. There has always been a touch of mystery about his character, which to most people is in itself a charm. The mystery consists chiefly in a mixture of apparent contraries in his nature. Thus NEWMAN'S personal influence {188} on men has always been extraordinary. On the other hand, his history shows how singularly open he has been to be swayed by others, often vastly his inferiors, one would have said, in every respect. Again, his matchless literary power has given to his words and thoughts an influence in modifying and moulding educated opinion in England the extent of which has scarcely yet been recognised. Still NEWMAN was not really a learned man. He never gave himself time to become so. He was teaching and preaching and editing the Fathers when, if that had been his lifework, he should have been quietly reading them. Dean Stanley's celebrated saying, "How different contemporary English Church history would have been if NEWMAN had known German," is not less true than pungent. And so in many other aspects, e.g. his sweetness and his terrible power of sarcasm, NEWMAN was full of contraries.

The great crisis—shall we call it the great catastrophe? of NEWMAN'S life, his admission into the Church of Rome, is that which naturally attracts most notice in the newspaper articles which have appeared since his death. It is scarcely practical now to awake the old discussion as to why he went and whether if all had done their best his lapse might have been prevented. We have constantly insisted that NEWMAN'S perversion was not only inevitable but an act of justice. He and his friends, not without some head-strong self-conceit, but still with perfect sincerity and honesty, weaved a system and collected opinions for themselves which were substantially identical with the extreme High Church or Ritualistic position ever since. But when NEWMAN came to look at his own work he was too keen-witted not to perceive, and far too honest not to acknowledge, that he had drifted utterly and hopelessly from the teaching and standpoint of the Church of England, that he could not without disloyalty accept the Reformation, and that his right place was in the unreformed Church of Rome. Tract XC. was NEWMAN'S last despairing effort, not to mislead others, but to persuade himself that he might {189} remain amongst us with a good conscience. Whatever it may have seemed to his followers, to him it was a failure, and he took what appeared to him the only course consistent with truth. * * * * *

Referee

During the early fifties there came to this country one Dr. Achilli, who had formerly been a Catholic priest, but who, having been unfrocked because of a life which is scarcely described by the word immoral—who was, in fact, one of the most disgusting and unnatural monsters that ever covered up wickedness under the cloak of religion—conceived the idea that the best of all ways to get a good living was to come to England as a thorough-paced Protestant preacher, and to go about exposing the enormities of the Catholic Church and the atrocities of its Inquisition. The plan took exceeding well; he was patronised and feted by the great of the land, thousands flocked to hear him, and he must have earned a very comfortable income indeed by means of his denunciations of the Church of which he was formerly so unworthy a member. His attacks were so villainous that several exposures of his previous life were published; none, however, were so fierce and so scathing as Dr. NEWMAN'S. This appeared in a pamphlet entitled, "Lectures on the Present Position of Catholics in England." Achilli staggered under the blow administered by the greatest master of controversial fence this century has seen, and finding that his receipts were dropping off and that people were going about reciting Dr. NEWMAN'S charges against him, he looked about for the surest means of dealing a felon blow at his chivalrous enemy. Not that those who so readily recited the denunciation of the wily Italian cared anything for Dr. NEWMAN; indeed, they were rather in favour of Dr. Achilli, but they could not {190} resist the burning satire of the great and honest and noble Englishman, who possessed at once the gentlest soul and the most courageous body, the purest life and the keenest sensibility, who was the kindest-hearted man and the fiercest controversialist of his time, and whose vast knowledge of men and general worldly wisdom was only to be balanced by his piety, his docility, and (in matters of faith) his extreme simplicity; who was, to sum up, probably the most remarkable combination of the highest qualities either the Church of England or the English Church of Rome ever discovered in one frail human structure.

Ripon Chronicle

(Same as Scarborough Evening News.)

Rochdale Observer

(Same as Leicester Daily Post.)

Rochdale Times

Those who are old enough to remember the movement from which grew the "Tracts for the Times," and their number is now very small, and rapidly growing smaller, the death of Cardinal NEWMAN will recall the most interesting associations. That movement although called by the name of Pusey—we know not why—had been equally under the guidance with him of Keble and of NEWMAN; of this triumvirate, NEWMAN was undoubtedly the chief—the master spirit whose powerful intellect and whose resolute will secured to him the place of authority as leader. It is not yet sixty years since the memorable Tractarian period opened, yet how distant does it {191} seem, and what changes have come over the Anglican Church since then. The alteration in ritual, the increase of sacerdotalism, the elaborate music, the flowers, lights, and incense which are adopted in many churches now, but more than is known, mark with a distinctness which cannot be ignored the changed condition of the National Church. It is not our purpose here to inquire whether this change be for good or evil; we merely point to the fact that English Protestantism as it existed in 1833 is very different indeed from the Anglicanism of today or even from the Protestantism of the Nonconformist denomination as we see it around us. And anyone that studies the history of the period will see that this change is traceable back to the Tractarian movement, of which, as we have said, NEWMAN was the foremost spirit. This fact invests with an interest which extends to the whole religious world the death of JOHN HENRY NEWMAN.

Rock

Unfortunately, for himself, for our church and for our country, Cardinal NEWMAN'S great intellect and undoubted piety were misdirected, and instead of rising, as he might have done, to the highest position in our Church, to have helped to guide and direct his fellow-countrymen in matters of religion, he has done, perhaps, more than most of his contemporaries to perplex and puzzle earnest-minded seekers after truth. A great scholar, and one endowed with a naturally loving, gentle nature, he might have done very much in the attempt to solve some of the great problems of life, and to show men how they could so pass through things temporal so that finally they lose not things eternal. There was about him that peculiar charm of character which fascinated many who could not possibly agree with him, and such a nature is always {192} of great value to the owner. Both Dr. NEWMAN and his brother had minds cast in a peculiar mould, and neither of them could accept things as they found them. The brother, as many know, drifted very far from orthodox religion, and ceased even to call himself a Christian. JOHN HENRY NEWMAN, like his brother, was of an active, restless turn of mind, with a tendency to see the bad side of that to which he was accustomed, and the good side of other things. * * * * *

For our own part we have never been able to agree with Canon Kingsley that NEWMAN was a dishonest man, and whatever other failings he may have had, this one, at all events, cannot be laid to his door. We only wish that all those who held his views had been as honest and as logical. During the storm that arose after the publication of Tract No. XC., NEWMAN saw clearly that the Church of England was far more Protestant than he had believed. From 1833 to 1841 he had been looking at the Church exclusively from the standpoint of such one-sided men as Keble and Pusey, and he honestly believed the national Church of this country to be more Romish than it was. But from 1841 till 1845, when he seceded from our Church and joined the Church of Rome, the truth was gradually being forced upon him that the English Church was more distinctly Protestant than he had given it credit for. There must be an interval in the life of every man who changes his political or religious party or his Church when his inner convictions are to a certain extent opposed to his outward life. That period in the life of NEWMAN was a very short one, not extending over three years. No sooner was he fully convinced of the Protestant nature of our communion than he played the part of an honest man, and, at a great sacrifice to himself, he left our communion. Men like Pusey may be accused of being illogical, and may even appear to others to be dishonest, but such a charge cannot be made against NEWMAN, who was as thorough and logical as he was misguided. * * * * *

Altogether it is difficult to think about the career of NEWMAN {193} without an inexpressible feeling of sadness, there was so much that was noble, pure, and good in his life, and he was so richly endowed with Nature's gifts, that one cannot but feel that his life might have been so different, and he might have done so much good to his countrymen. Had he been born in a less controversial age, his saintly life and simple character might have won many to that Saviour whom he loved so devoutly. As it was, he has done much to mislead his fellow-creatures, and to sow the seeds of religious strife that are likely to bear fruit for centuries. Yet one cannot but feel that his errors were those of the intellect rather than those of the heart.

Newcastle Daily Chronicle

The death of Cardinal NEWMAN last night at the Oratory, Birmingham, has closed a great career. In many respects his Eminence was one of the most illustrious of Englishmen. Despite the important modifications which his opinions received on many subjects, he remained essentially an Englishman, and his countrymen of all creeds were proud of the Cardinal. His Catholicism had a distinct flavour of nationality. An ardent disciple of the Church of Rome, he was yet in many ways one of the most independent of thinkers. Beyond most English theologians his theology was essentially biblical. Even those who have no intention to follow his Eminence into the spiritual haven, where his perturbed spirit sought rest, find it advantageous to study his works. These works display the highest qualities of a thoroughly disciplined intellect. In their study we are subjected to a spiritual discipline of no common order. It is difficult sometimes whether more to admire the felicity of expression or the profundity of thought. His sermons are unequalled, alike in their subtle analysis of character, and the ease and grace with which that analysis is conducted. Here his qualities {194} remind us of Byron. The Author of "Childe Harold" in the highest manifestation of his genius, never labours. There is no trace of effort in even his grandest passages. This absence of all straining after effect is equally obvious in NEWMAN. * * * * * Young NEWMAN early knew the Bible by heart. This knowledge—retained through life—was a precious possession. His sermons are redolent with the aroma of the sacred volume. Those who knew of this familiarity, regretted that his exquisite taste was not utilised on the revision of the authorised version. News of Cardinal NEWMAN'S works have admired the appositeness of his references to music. But it is not generally known that he early mastered that science, attaining such proficiency on the violin that had he not become a dignitary of the Church he might have been a Paganini. * * * * *

Dr. NEWMAN'S was one of those intellects that do not work in ordinary grooves, hence the difficulty of anticipating where he might find anchorage. In 1845 he entered the Roman Communion. But, from youth upward, the Cardinal might be described as "tree yielding seed whose fruit was in itself." He was too original to be manipulated, and, with characteristic wisdom, the Vatican left the accomplished man very much to himself. Had Oxford exhibited a similar sagacity, it is possible that he might have remained in the English Church. It was impossible for anyone with the faintest spiritual discernment to remain unimpressed by the elevation of Dr. NEWMAN'S character, and the purity of his life.

Newcastle Leader

Cardinal NEWMAN is dead. There are few Englishmen, of whatever sect and of whatever social position, to whom this simple announcement will not come as a great shock. Genius rises above creed and class; and Catholic and Protestant alike {195} will feel that the man who passed away yesterday belonged to the nation. Two churches, indeed, may claim a special interest in him, for his years were almost equally divided between Anglicanism and Catholicism, but while he never affected that sterile neutrality of thought which is now so fashionable he conciliated the adherents of every body by his enlightened sincerity and his breadth of cultivated character. Not religion alone, but English literature loses in him a great personality. With him, in fact, as with all profound natures, these two interests were not divided. He was never a mere writer, but always a Christian. His style was not himself only, but his purpose. He was incapable of the puerilities of an art without an argument, of books without belief, of eloquence which is only a manifestation of idiosyncracy. He wrote to expound truth, or to illustrate it; and his genius was none the less deep, tender, vivifying, exalted, because he gave himself to a great cause, and profited by its inspiration. Amongst all the productions of this consummate stylist we search in vain for evidences of mere trifling. As an Anglican or as a Catholic, he held religion to be the greatest of human concerns, and his mastery of literary order was the closest consequence of his possession of commanding motive. * * * * * The retreat of the great Catholic had long been a centre of interest for all cultivated Englishmen; and many who had little culture but much reverence for a pure and noble life made a point of visiting Birmingham for no other purpose than that of catching a glimpse of the famous Oratorian. Amidst the bustle of the Midland capital this meditative and tranquil nature was accepted as an influence of consecration; and while of those who went to see its distinguished citizen many, of course, did so because they shared the principles of the Cardinal, a still larger number probably went because they honoured the character of the man. Of late years no doubt nothing had occurred to render this expression of homage {196} difficult. The old controversies had died away. The strife which once divided England had left only feeble echoes behind it. Protestant had ceased to be resentful, and Catholic was no longer simply jubilant. The fierceness with which JOHN HENRY NEWMAN was once assailed had given way to a common recognition of his sincerity if not necessarily to a common quiescence in his views. He was no longer regarded on the one side as a pervert and on the other as a convert, but was accepted by all Englishmen as an Englishman of genius. He himself did nothing to disturb this general attitude of sympathy and admiration. In becoming a Catholic he had not ceased to be a citizen. He practised no narrow isolation, and aimed at no ascetic reserve. He was concentrated, of course, on his tasks, and his tasks were of genius and of religion; but his sympathies were never withdrawn from the active life of his countrymen, and he showed no resentful churlishness when the world changed its tone towards him, and began to honour where it had once condemned. * * * * *

Evangelical, Latitudinarian, and Noncomformist can join in recognising that the reaction of fifty years ago was not without its wholesome influence, and that if Dr. NEWMAN ceased to be an Anglican it was only because his convictions compelled him to be a Catholic. No eager sectarianism, anxious for summary judgments, can do justice to the motives which led this ardent and delicate mind to abandon its convictions and companionships for the isolation of a new departure. "You may think how lonely I am," wrote NEWMAN, shortly after his reception into the Catholic Church, "'Obliviscere populum tuum et domum patris tui' has been in my ears for the last twelve hours." The step was taken, however, with courage and resolution; the controversies were accepted; the inevitable separations were quietly faced.

It is difficult for us now to realise what all this meant. We have fallen on a flatter time. Catholicism does not now occupy {197} the position in England which was assigned to it by the narrower sympathies of forty years ago. Its views have ceased to alarm us; its organisation no longer terrifies; its hierarchy is accepted without question; and bugbears which once divided political parties now fail to move the imagination of any Englishman. It is a church free like other churches to teach and do good in its own way; and Protestants of every sect are willing to co-operate with it in the work of social progress. Undoubtedly, no small part of this larger charity and these wider sympathies is due to the influence of Cardinal NEWMAN. As a Catholic he never affected a meaningless liberality. He pronounced for conviction and not for compromise. He brought to the church of his adoption no nerveless character and no equivocal evasions. He gave to the new what he had given to the old—genius, strength, definiteness, firmness. The strength, however, was tempered by sweetness, the definiteness was not narrow, but broad and human. He conciliated where he did not convert; he inspired where he could not hope to convince. Amidst the conflicts of opinion he showed not the pettiness of controversy but the zeal for truth, and amidst the attacks of narrow rancour he exhibited the dignity of a spacious manhood. Even a Keble could attribute his conversion to failing intellect, but the most obscure sectary in England would not share this judgment now. Cardinal NEWMAN has lived his life, and the verdict is to come; but that the life was a life of high purpose, of overmastering sincerity, a life inspired by the various intuitions of genius, and governed by the eternal soul of religion—this may be safely said now, without any fear of the corrections of posterity.

New York Herald

The death of Cardinal NEWMAN removes from the world one of the greatest men this century has produced. The work which {198} he did for the Roman Catholic Church can never be forgotten, either by those who looked upon it with regret, or by those who welcomed it. Lord Beaconsfield said a few years ago that the Church of England still reeled from the blow his secession inflicted upon it, and assuredly the effects of that momentous step are not even yet exhausted. Few men the world has ever seen have left behind them a more stainless name, for his life was that of a saint, absolutely free from reproach before men. His writings will last for ages to come, for never was the English language written with greater beauty and charm. The life of Cardinal NEWMAN cannot be given here—it would, if adequately treated, fill volumes; and it is not too much to say that it has created a new current in English history. He is one of the very last survivors of the illustrious men who came to us from a former generation, and it will be long before the Roman Catholic Church, whatever good fortune it may experience, finds again so devoted, powerful, and noble an adherent on these shores.

Northern Echo

The death of Cardinal NEWMAN has aroused a sense of loss all England over irrespective of creed or opinion. His was not a man with a social mission, a publicist nor a divine who sought to catch the public eye. His life, except for one great act of courage and one controversy which led him into the law courts, was scarcely chequered by incident. He could adopt at the bidding of duty a religious faith whose adherents are in a minority in this country, whose bitter enemies are active and numerous, and his work since his lot in life was finally fixed has had purposes with which the bulk of English men and women have no sympathy. Whence, then, the loving respect in which Cardinal NEWMAN lived, the affectionate sorrow with which the news of {199} his death is heard? Because he was a great theologian, a keen controversialist, a master of a style as clear and beautiful and going as straight to its end as a running brook? This is scarcely the explanation of JOHN HENRY NEWMAN'S position among his countrymen. It was the man and not the controversialist whom they revered, the pious thinker who dared to follow what he believed to be truth wherever it might lead, the Christian who was ever sincere, ever aspiring to purity and peace, and who poured out from within him that which touched and elevated thousands who had no sympathy with the forms in which he clothed his inward belief. * * * * * What NEWMAN might have become had he remained in his first communion it were idle to speculate. On the Catholic Church and on his countrymen at large his influence has been purely moral. The high dignity to which he attained was a tribute to the beauty of holiness—the holiness of the cloister, the closet, and the peaceful ways of secluded religious communion. His intellect and lofty character may have helped Protestants to take a kindlier view of their Catholic brethren; but he never took the place which Cardinal Manning has taken in the public, social, and philanthropic life of his countrymen. He remained a star that dwelt apart. He had ever a fine contempt for much that the age regards as triumph. He cared nothing for material prosperity. "The Church," he said, "considers the action of this world and the action of the soul simply incommensurate, viewed in their respective spheres; she would rather save the soul of one single wild bandit of Calabria, or whining beggar of Palermo, than draw a hundred lines of railroad through the length of Italy, or carry out a sanitary reform in its fullest details in every city of Sicily, except so far as these great national works tended to some spiritual good beyond them." There is truth in this; but not all the truth. A soul is worth more than a hundred miles of railway—more than a hundred millions! {200} But then there is nothing antagonistic between the making of railways and the saving of souls. He who would serve mankind must serve his own generation, and serve them by every means that is allotted to his powers, whether in things spiritual or things material, and contempt of either is alike an impediment to the full development of man.

Northern Whig

Cardinal NEWMAN'S career, in more senses than one, will always be regarded as notable. A distinguished scholar, with high literary powers, and of an earnest nature, he made a deep impression at Oxford on the younger members of that famous seat of learning by his force of personality.

Notts Evening Post

The death of Cardinal NEWMAN has been the subject of many sympathetic references in circles of thought that could not by any stretch of reason have any love of his religious or ecclesiastical tendencies. In the brave words that the English Press have, as a body, written about him, only the Christian and the man have been thought of—not his theological teaching, but his warmth and sincerity of conviction. "At the end of a long and laborious life a great Englishman has left us!" That was the keynote to the great mass of criticism that was passed upon him the day after his death, and this fact has so impressed Continental observers that a representative journal like the North German Press, has just declared in connection with it:—"May we live to see the day when on the decease of a great ecclesiastic and compatriot, to whichever confession he may belong, we may read in all good patriotic journals the unanimous admission, 'he was a {201} great German." Cardinal NEWMAN, then, would not have lived in vain if he had done nothing better or higher or nobler than prove in his death that a firm hold on a faith such as his can be appreciated at its true worth altogether beyond its particular religious or ecclesiastical tendencies. Apart from that, however there is general desire to honour the memory of a man who bravely faced his spiritual difficulties and did not fear to follow them to what he considered were their logical conclusions.

Notts Express

Though JOHN HENRY NEWMAN died a Prince of the Church of Rome, he had never ceased to be pre-eminently an Englishman. Not even Ruskin could match his subtle pellucid diction. The "well of English undefiled" which rippled out from the sanctuary of his strong mind and pure heart chiefly reached the people through secondary channels. Cardinal NEWMAN directly influenced leaders of thought and action rather than the democracy. Yet there is at least one exception to this; for what has been more helpful to, or better "understanded of the common people," in their dark hours than NEWMAN'S hymn, "Lead, kindly Light!" The Cardinal's "mystical lore" is a dangerous maze for the theological adventurer to enter, but his long saintly life has been a needed reminder amid the hurly-burly of the Nineteenth Century that "man doth not live by bread alone." * * * * * The Cardinal revelled in patristic erudition, nourished his mystical nature on Sacerdotal tradition and sacramental practice, and was able, amid the wind and tide of changing theology, to anchor his faith to the "doctrine of the Pope's Infallibility." {202}

Observer

It is perhaps the strongest proof of the esteem and admiration in which the late Cardinal NEWMAN was held by his countrymen that his death has called forth so many enthusiastic obituary notices from public writers, to the majority of whom he must long have been merely the shadow of a great name. Conventional as much of the praise bestowed upon him has been, it testifies pleasingly enough to the enduring tradition of NEWMAN'S greatness both as a leader of religious thought and as a man of letters. The eulogies bestowed upon him in this latter capacity, however, have been of a singularly guarded character, and have only in occasional instances appeared to indicate any very extensive familiarity on the part of the eulogist with the writings which they profess to hold in such admiring reverence.

Perhaps we should not be far wrong in saying that the majority of the obituarists have firmly grasped the fact that the late Cardinal wrote the hymn beginning "Lead, kindly Light," and that he was the author of the Apologia and the Grammar of Assent. A few more seem to have heard of the Dream of Gerontius; but with his greater prose writings there seems to be but little genuine contemporary acquaintance. It is a pity, for there could be no better corrective of our prevailing literary vices of gush and gabble than a diligent study of the noble simplicity, the high reserve and self-respect, of that incomparable style. There have been writers and pulpit orators who have equalled the late Cardinal in lucidity and moral impressiveness, and have excelled him in the mere eloquence of imagery and illustration; but none in our age, or perhaps in any age, has ever succeeded in combining all the persuasiveness of the intimate, the familiar, the personal, in appeal and counsel, with the dignity which belongs to a Divine emissary charged with the duties of exhortation, warning, and rebuke. {203}

Overland Mail

The profound and general emotion felt throughout England at the news of Cardinal NEWMAN'S death is hardly compatible with at least two theories which, as a rule, pass uncontradicted. One so often hears it said that men of intellect in this country, unless theology happen to be a branch of their profession, no longer take an interest in forms of religious belief, having for the most part decided that religion may be left to priests and women. It is no less commonly asserted that only a small and select class of Englishmen is capable of holding opinions on any question which only appeals to persons of culture and education. The recollections evoked by Cardinal NEWMAN'S death would serve to demolish both theories. A man whose career places him on a level with the greatest Churchmen not only of English, but of European history is universally recognised as one of the foremost men of the day; while it may safely be said that the controversies in which he was engaged have had a real meaning, not only to his personal followers and adversaries, but to the majority of that section of his countrymen which may roughly be defined as embracing the middle classes. The high estimation in which he is held is not to be ascribed solely to his surpassing power of literary composition. Cardinal NEWMAN will be remembered as an eminent ecclesiastic; and as such he is rightly spoken of as one of the greatest Englishmen of the time.

Penny Illustrated

So Cardinal NEWMAN is dead. What a blank it seems to leave in the national life—not that the Cardinal ever had very much to do with what makes up the average lives of most of us—politicians, men of business, workers, and what not. He lived apart, sending only occasional {204} messages to the great world which knew him as a figure more saintly and beautiful than the common. * * * * * All that we have heard went to confirm the popular idea of the Cardinal's intellect and moral beauty.

Piccadilly

Cardinal NEWMAN was a feature in the country. He, from motives of the purest conviction, joined the Roman Catholic Church. Ambitious he never was. Solitary, almost, in his Oratory at Birmingham, he laboured for Christianity. Yet he was benevolent to all creeds, however much they might differ from his own. In his life the purest of men, perhaps the only fault he had was that he believed that all men were like himself pure. An honest man, a great Englishman, has passed from amongst us; and I think that, however much we may differ from Cardinal NEWMAN'S views, it is our united duty to lay a wreath on his grave; for are there not millions of us who, in the words of his own exquisite lyric, can say

Whom we have loved long since, and lost awhile?

It was in a moment of deepest depression, when, severed from olden comrades, he was about to take important and untried theological steps, that the shadow around him suggested that line which will never die, "Lead, kindly Light," another proof of the wisdom of the ancients when they wrote their motto "Lux ex Nube," for his cloud has been his generation's lustre.

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