theory, again, which said that all religious bodies were equally good, and that it makes no difference to which a man belongs, must be untrue. Any theory which did not put prominently forward the duty of Christians to promote Christian unity would be untrue to Christ's purpose.

Then, thirdly, it is this theory which has been accepted and agreed upon in the Conferences which have been taking place between Churchmen and Nonconformists with a view to Christian unity. The report states it so admirably that I will quote it in full.

ON THE NATURE OF THE CHURCH.

1. The foundation of the Church rests not upon the will or consent or beliefs of men, whether as individuals or as societies, but upon the creative Will of God.

2. The Church is the Body of Christ, and its constitutive principle is Christ Himself, living in His members through His Spirit.

3. As there is but one Christ, and one Life in Him, so there is and can be but one Church.

4. This one Church consists of all those who have been, or are being, redeemed by and in Christ, whether in this world or in the world beyond our sight, but it has its expression in this world in a visible form. Yet the Church, as invisible and as visible, is, by virtue of its one life in Christ, one.

5. This visible Church was instituted by Christ as a fellowship of men united with Him, and in Him with one another, to be His witness and His instrument in the spread of His Kingdom on earth.

6. As a visible Church it must possess certain visible and recognizable marks whereby it can be seen and known by men. These have been, since the days of the Apostles at least, the following: (a) The profession of faith in God as revealed and incarnate in Christ; (b) the observance of the two Sacraments ordained by Christ Himself; (c) an ideal of the Christian life protected by a common discipline; (d) a ministry, representative of the Church, for the preaching of the word, the administration

WHS

THE NATURE OF THE CHURCH

23

of the Sacraments, and the maintenance of the unity and continuity of the Church's witness and work.

7. Baptism is by the ordinance of Christ and of His Apostles the outward and visible sign of admission into membership of the Church.

8. The Church visible on earth ought to express and manifest to the world by its own visible unity the one Life in Christ of the one Body.

9. The true relation of the Church and local Churches is that which is described in the New Testament-namely, that the Churches are the local representatives of the One Church. The actual situation brought about in the course of history, in which there are different and even rival denominational Churches independent of each other and existing together in the same locality, whatever justification arising out of historical circumstances may be claimed for these temporary separations, cannot be regarded as in accordance with the Purpose of Christ, and every endeavour ought to be made to restore the true position as set forth in the New Testament.

10. The marks which ought to characterize the Church visible on earth are possessed by these existing separate Churches and societies of Christian people in very varying degrees of completeness or defect. Hence, even though they be parts of the visible Church, they cannot be considered as all alike, giving equally adequate expression to the Lord's Mind and Purpose. Some, indeed, may be so defective that they cannot rightly be judged to be parts of that Church. But such judgments, though made in trust that they are in accordance with the Divine Mind, must be regarded as limited to the sphere of the visible Church as an ordered society here on earth. It would be presumption to claim that they have a like validity in the sphere of the whole Church as the One Body of the redeemed in Christ, for within that sphere judgment can only be given by the All-knowing Mind and Sovereign Mercy of God.

Now from this theory of the Church, in relation to the facts of the present day, two deductions may be made. The first is this, that when we are considering the Church of England, we need not be too careful to prove

that it is part of the true Church. It certainly is that. We should rather be anxious to ask ourselves: In what way is it imperfect? How far does it come short of its ideal? In what way can we best correct, reform, or beautify our Church? What can we learn from other religious bodies?

And then, next, we must avoid presenting ourselves to the world, or in any way claim to be "the Church." We must not go to other Christian societies and say:

We are the Church; you are schismatics, come into us.' We know how offensive and ridiculous it appears to us when the controversialists of the Roman Church come to us and say: "We are the true and only Church; to us you must come; with us alone is salvation." It is obvious that that is a claim which does not harmonize with reality. We must be equally careful that we do not act as offensively and ridiculously ourselves. But we do so if we go to the Nonconformist Churches and say: "We are the Church, and you are outside it." If the Scottish Episcopal Church says to the Presbyterians of Scotland, "We are the true Church, you are not the Church," they are making themselves ridiculous. Rather we should say: "We are all imperfect representations of that Church which should be one." That Church, through faults which are partly ours, is divided; through prejudices in which we share, fails to come together. We may rightly believe that we have something to contribute to the common unity. We may quite justly be ready to defend our practices and ways, but we must make no claim to superiority. Whenever the Christian minister adopts the line of the master and the superior, he is departing from the example of Christ. We should be loyal to our own Church, but we should combine that loyality with a passion for truth, with a readiness to learn, and with wide human sympathies.

The Church of England has learnt much in the last hundred years. It has also taught much. It has, I think, more to teach, but it can only teach if it is always learning.

CHAPTER II

THE CHURCH OF ENGLAND: HOW IT CAME

TO BE WHAT IT IS

I PROPOSE to discuss with you to-day the Church of England, and to attempt to discover how it came to be what it is. I have already pointed out that it has certain features which separate it from other religious bodies; that it is not altogether easy to understand; and that it has various elements in it which to some appear to be inconsistent with one another. To understand it properly, we must start with its history, and I propose to say something about the Anglo-Saxon Church, the Medieval Church, the Church of the Reformation (including under that heading the whole period until the final settlement at the Restoration), and then the Church of our own time.1

I

The first period, the period of the Anglo-Saxon Church, ends just at the time when the final division took place between East and West. We have, therefore, to think of the English Church of that period as being part of an undivided Universal Church, and we have an interesting reminder of that in the fact that one of the greatest of the early Archbishops of Canterbury was Theodore of Tarsus, a Greek, to whom this Church and country owe the first systematic organization of its religious life.

The main characteristics of the English Church of the earliest period seem to me to have been as follows:

First of all, it was a Church with a double origin. While we owe our organization to the mission of St.

1 I have not thought it necessary to give any detailed references in this chapter. I am dealing with well-known facts, such as may be found in any Church History.

Augustine, sent by the Church of Rome, a large part of the evangelization of the country was the work of missionaries from Scotland, and ultimately from Ireland. I can remember the time some years ago when it was the custom to lay great stress, perhaps an exaggerated stress, on the Celtic Mission. It was relied upon as an argument for the independence of the Church of England as against the Church of Rome. Now I notice a tendency to reaction; it has become customary to ignore very largely the work of the Scotch missionaries. I am afraid, as a North-countryman, I cannot acquiesce in the tendency to ignore their work, nor can I think it of little importance. Nor, I think, can the Church of Gloucester, linked as it has been with Northumbrian Christianity, forget this element in our history. The two types of Christianity which came in, one from the north, the other from the south, were different. The mission from the south linked the country up with the civilized world of the time. It brought it in contact with learning, and it gave, what was much needed, organization and discipline. But the Celtic Mission brought a more sincere and simple religious faith, and a keener insight into spiritual things. The combination of these two elements in our national history is one the influence of which we feel at the present day.

In the second place, the early English Church came to be in a marked way a National Church. The building up of Christianity in the country was, from the beginning, largely the work of Kings, and some of the most attractive and greatest names in early English Church history are those of Kings, Oswald and Alfred, to take two of the most conspicuous instances. It has often been pointed out that the unity of the Church preceded the unity of the Nation, and that the unified Church organization introduced by Theodore was one of the potent elements which helped in building up the unified national life. When once there was one Church, it became easy for there to be one Nation. But in other ways, too, the Church was very closely connected with the national