heads-as, e.g. the chaplain's stipend-are to be made out of the funds of the sanitary authority derived as already explained.

Such, in a general outline, is the scope of the new Act, and we think that it is not too much to say that it is sufficiently comprehensive and flexible. Every case and every need is provided for. We observe also that the circular from the Local Government Board carefully points out that the Act not only may, but must, be put in force in all cases where the existing burial-grounds are either insufficient for lack of space or unsuitable on any other sanitary ground. The consequence is, that it now rests entirely with local Churchmen to see that the factitious grievance, of which during late years the Liberation Society and Mr. O. Morgan have made so much, be not only swept away, but be visibly and manifestly removed. Surely every Board of Guardians of the Poor should follow in the steps of those of Milton in Kent and of Darlington, and order an immediate inspection of all burialgrounds within their union, and then at once put the Act in force wherever need is found to exist. We do not suppose that this will at once silence the Liberation Society's agitation. That agitation exists only in the towns where the factitious grievance has no existence at all. In the country, where it is alleged to exist, nobody wishes to follow Mr. Morgan in his invasion of the churchyards. So far as inflammatory speech-making and pamphleteering in the great centres of population are concerned, we must expect that for some time longer it will yet continue. But the perfect fairness of the present Act, its equal provision for persons of every religious persuasion, and the ease with which it may be worked, will we trust, be so soon actually felt and experienced as to cut the ground from under any agitation wherever that agitation. comes to the test of actual discussion among the well informed. As to the state of our rural churchyards, we may notice that the Bishop of Bath and Wells reports that out of 501 parishes or chapelries with churchyards still in use, the churchyard was either now, or soon would be, over-full in 144 cases; and if this is so in a sparsely-populated diocese like his, we may easily imagine what the case is in the country at large. As to the cost of carrying out the Act, it is surprising how very little it need be. To come to details we may add that one rood of land is adequate for the interment of 1,000 persons, and that the cost of one rood, plus the conveyance, and fencing and gates, need not, since it is rural neighbourhoods that we are considering, exceed 160l. A chapel, which we hope in many cases would be needless, need not cost more than 250%. But there is a special pro

vision empowering the local sanitary authority to receive and hold gifts of land and money for cemetery purposes, so that in many cases, even this very moderate original outlay may hardly be required.

On the whole, then, we feel that if throughout the rural districts Church people are only true to themselves, this Act of Mr. Marten's may prove to have been the turning point in the history of as vexatious a controversy as it has been our lot to be concerned in. It removes the whole question from the atmosphere of polemical controversy; it deals with it upon broad, statesmanlike, and sanitary grounds; it is singularly flexible, and it lends itself with equal readiness to every form in which the need for its application can arise. All that remains is that, where needful, it be promptly applied and brought into action.

ART. IX.-THE DOCTRINE OF THE FATHERS ON THE REAL PRESENCE.

The Doctrine of the Real Presence as contained in the Fathers. Notes on a Sermon, 'The Presence of Christ in the Holy Eucharist,' by the Rev. E. B. PUSEY, D.D., Regius Professor of Hebrew; Canon of Christchurch; late Fellow of Oriel College. (Oxford and London, 1879.)

SOME years ago a certain Dr. Harrison attacked Dr. Pusey's work on the Doctrine of the Real Presence. He published two bulky volumes, entitled 'An Answer to Dr. Pusey's Challenge respecting the Doctrine of the Real Presence, in which the doctrines of the Lord's Supper, as held by him, Roman and Greek Catholics, Ritualists, and High Anglo-Catholics, are examined and shown to be contrary to the Holy Scriptures, and to the teaching of the Fathers of the first eight centuries.' We have looked into the work, and find it to be a confused, blundering, acrid, and altogether impossible book. Such as it is, however, it was welcomed with enthusiasm by a certain class. It was extensively reviewed, we are told, in no less than thirty-three periodicals.' The thirty-three editors duly praised it; but, alas! even while in the act of praising it, by some unexplained fatality, they were driven to the same conclusion regarding it as ourselves, viz. that the book is really an impossible book. What a pity! For, if the position taken up by the writer could be sustained, what utter

ruin might not be carried into the ranks of Ritualists and High Anglican bishops! The Fathers against them! And then the great Doctor himself, nothing else but a miserable—well, we shall not say what. Under the influence of this glorious prospect the Christian Advocate exclaimed, 'Could the proofs of Dr. Pusey's inaccuracy be marshalled in a pointed and effective manner '-alas, Dr. Harrison! so your book was not pointed and effective, then; cruel Christian Advocate!' so as to bring them within the examination of ordinary readers'—was it then an utterly impossible book, which no ordinary reader could be expected to get through?—'a blow would be struck at sacerdotal theology, of which it would be difficult to overrate the effects.'

Not discouraged, but rather animated by these cheering words, Dr. Harrison again set to work to produce the 'pointed and effective' book. The result was, 'The Fathers versus Dr. Pusey: an Exposure of his Unfair Treatment of their Evidence on the Doctrine of the Real Presence.' Alas! alas! This second attempt was no more pointed and effective than the former. The acridity remained the same, but unhappily, along with it, the same confusion, the same blundering, the same inability to make intelligible what he would be at. It had, however, one advantage, which the former did not possess ; it had only 168 pages, which certainly was something. All this time, however, Dr. Harrison was lifting up his pen in the wilderness. It had been anticipated that this bold attempt to claim the Fathers for the Protestant side, and to refute Dr. Pusey, would raise a perfect storm in the Ritualistic and High Church camp. Instead of that there was perfect silence even of the good-natured kind. Not even the majestic chal, enge of the Christian Observer could elicit a single word.

'There must be some one among them,' writes that editor, 'although there may probably not be many, who has sufficient acquaintance with patristic learning to rebut the crushing exposure, if indeed the assertions of Dr. Harrison can be met. As it is, Dr. Pusey is arraigned before the world on charges which amount to mendacity' -no less!' of the most shameful and disingenuous character. The system of Rome, it is true, is a system of forgery and lies; but he never has professed that he is a Romanist. We shall wait with much anxiety to see what answer can be made by him or for him.'

And he has waited ever since January 1874.

It does not appear to have struck either Dr. Harrison or his reviewers that there might be other reasons for this silence besides mere inability to reply. Men of science do not, as a rule, sit down to answer the marvellous pamphlets which from

time to time appear, to prove that the world is flat; so neither can a theologian be expected to take serious notice of wonderful assertions, such as that the Real Presence was unknown in the Church till the eighth century. Such statements are usually left to refute themselves. In truth, however, there is in Dr. Harrison's work a tone and a manner which is quite sufficient to cool the courage of even the most combatant Ritualist. Professor von Schulte remarks of the Ultramontane press of Germany, that it has gone to such lengths o absurdity, that it is positively ignored by the other side; and that its tone is so coarse and vulgar that silence is the most dignified mode of reply. To our great regret we must confess that a similar observation might be made regarding a certain wing of what was once the great and honoured Evangelical party. At any rate the general feeling on the part of the attacked was neatly expressed by John Bull as follows :

The

'In our blissful state of ignorance we have turned to the table of contents judiciously prefixed to the present publication, and we find that it is directed not merely against the metaphysical phrases of objective and subjective, but against the whole doctrine of the Real Presence, and the value of apostolical consecration itself. author undertakes to refute not only Dr. Pusey, Mr. Mackonochie, and the late Bishop Hamilton, but the novel criticisms of Bishop Wordsworth of Lincoln, and the misconceptions of Bishop Harold Browne. He "proves" that Zuingle's Eucharistic teaching is the same with that of Calvin, Cranmer, and Jewel. We are here content to stop, grateful for the forewarning which enables us to escape the rest of his 1,060 pages of Edinburgh divinity.'

. .

Nevertheless the theologian cannot afford, like the man of science, to keep absolute silence in the presence of absurdity and misrepresentation. The interests dependent on the truth are too momentous to allow it; and hence, to the great distress of the present writer, we find ourselves actually set down to review Dr. Harrison. The occasion of this proceeding it is necessary to impart to the reader. It would appear that Dr. Harrison has made yet another attempt at being pointed and effective. He has addressed a letter to Dr. Pusey, in which he has determined to reproduce 'some of the more striking instances of his unfair treatment of the testimony of the Fathers, together with a few decisive proofs that they did not believe the doctrine which Dr. Pusey ascribes to them, and to send a copy of the letter to every minister of the English Church, of which Church there are more than 23,000 ministers.' This proceeding has at last made some notice of Dr. Harrison's production necessary. It would be unfair to

⚫the clergy generally to leave them without aid in the presence of such an inundation; for however absurd these misrepresentations may appear in the eyes of scholars, still many of the clergy may not have the means of detecting them. Under strict injunction, therefore, from his editor, the present writer sets himself to the sorrowful task of examination. At the same time let it be understood how much he undertakes. He does not undertake to wade through the 1,060 pages of Edinburgh divinity, nor any other of the multifarious productions of the author. Solely this letter to Dr. Pusey ;-as being the 'pointed and effective' weapon long desired, and which, according to its author's assurance, is to be taken as embracing all his more striking instances.' This, therefore, and this alone, let us proceed to look into.

There are one or two observations of a general character which it is necessary to make before entering on our task.

In the first place we would seriously comment upon the tone and temper of Dr. Harrison's letter. It has fallen to the lot of the present writer to examine a greater number of theological tractates on this particular subject than happens to most people, and he can say with unfeigned truth that amongst these Dr. Pusey's work holds the very highest rank. There is in it a richness of detail, a spirit of candour and fairness, a comprehensive consideration of opposing views, and withal a spirit of Christian faith and love which illuminates and renders interesting long details which would otherwise be wearisome. And if we add to this, that on this, as on every occasion, he has shown the greatest consideration and respect for the conscientious convictions of others, we might have hoped that he would at least have been treated with respect. Instead of this he is pursued throughout with accusation and abuse of the most vulgar kind. We have seen the atrocious expressions which a writer in the Christian Observer has used-expressions which Dr. Harrison has not thought it improper to reproduce; and, indeed, this is but a specimen of similar observations which pervade the letter. The letter consists of little else but a series of passages from the Fathers, quite irrelevant to the matter in hand, and each passage is

1 Dr. Pusey remarks (Real Presence, p. 716):-'Albertinus did his utmost on the Calvinistic side. His strength lies in his arguments against a physical doctrine of Transubstantiation; his weakness in the paradox, which he strangely maintains, that the Fathers did not believe a Real Objective Presence. In so doing he treats the Fathers, as others of his school have treated Holy Scripture on the other Sacrament. When his school would disparage the doctrine of baptism, they select passages from Holy Scripture, in which it is not speaking of