lowing years I
put this ecclesiastical doctrine on a broader basis, after reading Laud,
Bramhall, and Stillingfleet and other Anglican divines on the one hand,
and after prosecuting the study of the Fathers on the other; but the
doctrine of 1833 was strengthened in me, not changed. When I began the
Tracts for the Times I rested the main doctrine, of which I am speaking,
upon Scripture, on the Anglican Prayer Book, and on St. Ignatius's
Epistles. (1) As to the existence of a visible Church, I especially
argued out the point from Scripture, in Tract 11, viz. from the Acts of
the Apostles and the Epistles. (2) As to the Sacraments and Sacramental
rites, I stood on the Prayer Book. I appealed to the Ordination Service,
in which the Bishop says, "Receive the Holy Ghost;" to the Visitation
Service, which teaches confession and absolution; to the Baptismal
Service, in which the Priest speaks of the child after baptism as
regenerate; to the Catechism, in which Sacramental Communion is
receiving "verily and indeed the Body and Blood of Christ;" to the
Commination Service, in which we are told to do "works of penance;" to
the Collects, Epistles, and Gospels, to the calendar and rubricks,
portions of the Prayer Book, wherein we find the festivals of the
Apostles, notice of certain other Saints, and days of fasting and
abstinence.

(3.) And further, as to the Episcopal system, I founded it upon the
Epistles of St. Ignatius, which inculcated it in various ways. One
passage especially impressed itself upon me: speaking of cases of
disobedience to ecclesiastical authority, he says, "A man does not
deceive that Bishop whom he sees, but he practises rather with the
Bishop Invisible, and so the question is not with flesh, but with God,
who knows the secret heart." I wished to act on this principle to the
letter, and I may say with confidence that I never consciously
transgressed it. I loved to act as feeling myself in my Bishop's sight,
as if it were the sight of God. It was one of my special supports and
safeguards against myself; I could not go very wrong while I had reason
to believe that I was in no respect displeasing him. It was not a mere
formal obedience to rule that I put before me, but I desired to please
him personally, as I considered him set over me by the Divine Hand. I
was strict in observing my clerical engagements, not only because they
_were_ engagements, but because I considered myself simply as the
servant and instru