eed be necessary, as a matter of form, in an
act of accusation, such as his pamphlet, but they are superfluous to
the good sense of any one who will only just look into the matter
himself.

Now, with respect to the so-called arguments which he ventures to put
forward in proof that the sermon is Romish, I shall answer them,
together with all his other arguments, in the latter portion of this
reply; here I do but draw the attention of the reader, as I have said
already, to the phenomenon itself, which he exhibits, of an unclouded
confidence that the sermon is the writing of a virtual member of the
Roman communion, and I do so because it has made a great impression
on my own mind, and has suggested to me the course that I shall
pursue in my answer to him.

I say, he takes it for granted that the Sermon is the writing of a
virtual or actual, of a conscious Roman Catholic; and is impatient at
the very notion of having to prove it. Father Newman and the Vicar of
St. Mary's are one and the same: there has been no change of mind in
him; what he believed then he believes now, and what he believes now
he believed then. To dispute this is frivolous; to distinguish
between his past self and his present is subtlety, and to ask for
proof of their identity is seeking opportunity to be sophistical.
This writer really thinks that he acts a straightforward honest part,
when he says "A Catholic Priest informs us in his Sermon on Wisdom
and Innocence preached at St. Mary's," and he thinks that I am the
shuffler and quibbler when I forbid him to do so. So singular a
phenomenon in a man of undoubted ability has struck me forcibly, and
I shall pursue the train of thought which it opens.

It is not he alone who entertains, and has entertained, such an
opinion of me and my writings. It is the impression of large classes
of men; the impression twenty years ago and the impression now. There
has been a general feeling that I was for years where I had no right
to be; that I was a "Romanist" in Protestant livery and service; that
I was doing the work of a hostile church in the bosom of the English
Establishment, and knew it, or ought to have known it. There was no
need of arguing about particular passages in my writings, when the
fact was so patent, as men thought it to be.

First it was certain, and I could not myself deny it, that I scouted
the name "Protestant." It was certain again, that many of the
doctrines which I professed were popularl