doctrinal decrees, the matter would no doubt be investigated, and, if the accusation were proved, the heretic would be condemned.1

But I am thinking rather of the standards of faith and doctrine with which members of the Church of England come into continual contact, and which they have, so to speak, in their hands. Of these I shall mention four :—namely (I.) the Creeds, (II.) the Catechism, (III.) the Prayer-book including the Ordinal, and (IV.) the Articles of Religion.

I. As the Church of England is bound by the doctrinal decrees of the accepted Ecumenical Councils, she necessarily accepts the Nicene Creed in the form in which it was drawn up and sanctioned by the first Council of Nicaea, and also the creed, commonly called the Constantinopolitan Creed, in the form in which it was sanctioned by the Council of Chalcedon. I remember the second of these being publicly used, when the Reverend Edmund S. Ffoulkes, who had previously seceded to the Roman Communion, was received back into the Communion of the Church of England by the late Dr. Samuel Wilberforce, Bishop of Winchester. But neither the original Nicene Creed nor the original Constantinopolitano-Chalcedonian Creed are commonly used either in public or private by English Church people. The creeds which we commonly use are (1) the Apostles' Creed, (2) a Western form of the Constantinopolitan Creed, and (3) the creed commonly called the Athanasian Creed.

(1) The Apostles' Creed is the old Roman Baptismal Creed of the first half of the second century, with a

1 See Phillimore's Ecclesiastical Law of the Church of England, 2nd edit., 1895, vol. ii. pp. 842-844.

few additions, mostly Gallican, of the fifth and sixth centuries. This is in England the most generally known of all the three creeds. It is the one which is used at Baptisms; and it is the one which is taught to children, when they learn their catechism; and it is the one which is rehearsed by the Priest to a dying person, when the office for the Visitation of the sick is being used; it is the one which normally is said daily in church at the two choir-offices of Mattins and Evensong; and finally it is the one which is almost universally used by English Church people, when they say their private prayers. As I have already mentioned, it was the baptismal creed of the local church in the city of Rome; and the missionaries, who went forth from that centre all over the West, carried it with them and taught it to their converts. The later additions to it were not made by any plenary Western Council, but by local churches in Gaul and elsewhere; and these additions were at last accepted at Rome, perhaps about the end of the seventh century, and finally the use of the enlarged creed became universal throughout the West.

(2) The second creed which is commonly used in the English Church is a Western form of the Constantinopolitan Creed. Speaking generally, one may say that the English form agrees with the Latin version of the Creed, as it was commonly used in the West during the middle ages. Both the English and the Latin

versions have an additional clause-"Deus de Deo," "God of God," inserted immediately before the clause -"Lumen de Lumine," "Light of Light"; and both have the addition of the expression-"Filioque," "and the Son," following the words "ex Patre," "from the

Father," in the clause which deals with the Procession of the Holy Ghost. But the English Version differs from the ordinary Latin Version, in that in the clause dealing with the Catholic and Apostolic Church the English Version omits the adjective, "Holy." It is certain that this word was not omitted for any dogmatic reason, because in the English Version of the Apostles' Creed, we every day express our belief in "the Holy Catholic Church." But it happened that in most of the early printed editions of the Councils, as for example in the editions of Merlin, Crabbe, and Carranza,1 the Constantinopolitan Creed appears without the word "Sanctam," "Holy," in the clause dealing with the Catholic Church and the compilers of our Prayer-book probably concluded that the word "Holy" was an interpolation, and omitted it for that reason."

This English Version of the Constantinopolitan Creed is the Creed used in the Church of England at Celebrations of the Holy Eucharist. The fact that it contains the expression-"Filioque" in the clause, which deals. with the Procession of the Holy Ghost, constitutes, I imagine, one of the principal obstacles to intercommunion between the Eastern Churches and the English Church. I am at present explaining to you what are the Church of England's standards of faith, and it would be confusing to your minds if I were now to interpolate a long digression on the Filioque; but I am quite ready to

1 Merlin's first edition was published at Paris in 1524, and his second edition in 1535. Crabbe's work was published at Cologne in 1538. Carranza's first edition was published at Venice in 1546, and his second at Salamanca in 1549.

2 See an article entitled "The Anglican Version of the 'Nicene Creed"" in the Church Quarterly Review, viii. 378, 379.

discuss the matter with Russian Theologians if such a discussion should be thought desirable.1

(3) The Athanasian Creed is the third creed which is regularly used by the Church of England. It sets forth very clearly and at considerable length the two great fundamental doctrines of the Holy Trinity in Unity, and of the Incarnation of the Second Person of the Blessed Trinity, and it contains some very salutary clauses, warning Catholic Christians of the danger of apostatizing from the Catholic faith. The teaching of this Creed is absolutely in harmony with the teaching of the great Doctor of the Church, S. Athanasius; but it was not written by S. Athanasius. He wrote in Greek, whereas this Creed was originally written in Latin. It is not certainly known when, where, or by whom it was written. But, following the most recent investigations, I am inclined to believe that it was written in Spain during the second half of the sixth century, and that its author was perhaps S. Martin, Archbishop of Braga.2

According to the use of the Church of England, the

1 By the kindness of Bishop (now Archbishop) Evlogie of Kholm I had the opportunity of conferring with a certain number of Russian Orthodox theologians on the Filioque clause a few days after this lecture was delivered. I was delighted to find that, when I explained the Filioque as equivalent to the Per Filium, and when I assured those with whom I was conferring that the theologians of the English Church condemned altogether the notion that there is more than one original ȧpx in the Godhead, they all declared that my explanation was in entire accordance with the teaching of the Eastern Orthodox Church. I also pointed out to them that local churches in the West had added on their own authority clauses to the Apostles' Creed, and that local churches in the East had added on their own authority clauses to the original Nicene Creed, and that consequently the addition of the Filioque to the Constantinopolitan Creed was a defensible proceeding. See also the Preface to this volume, pp. xiv, xv.

2 See the Lectures of the learned Benedictine, Dom Morin, published in the Journal of Theological Studies, vol. xii. pp. 161, 337. [But I see

Athanasian Creed takes the place of the Apostles' Creed at Mattins on all the chief festivals of the year and also on some few Saints' days.

I believe that the Athanasian Creed is never used in the public worship of the Orthodox Eastern Church; though it is printed, is it not? as a useful doctrinal instruction in the appendix to some editions of some Slavonic and some Greek service-books.

It is to be noticed that all these three creeds, the Apostles' Creed, the Western form of the Constantinopolitan Creed, and the Athanasian Creed, were in use in the greater part of the West, two centuries and a half before the final rupture between the East and the West. Their use in the West did not prevent there being intercommunion between the Eastern and Western branches of the Church.

II. I pass now from the Creeds to the Catechism, which is an Instruction by way of Question and Answer, to be learnt by every baptized member of the Church, before he is brought to be confirmed by the Bishop. The Catechism consists of two parts, the first of which contains an explanation of the Baptismal Covenant, and the second contains a short instruction about the two greater Sacraments, those two which are necessary for all classes of Christians, if they would be saved, and the only two, concerning which we have any assurance in the New Testament that they were explicitly instituted by Christ our Lord, while He was here on earth. These two greater Sacraments are of course Holy Baptism and the Holy Eucharist.

that, in the Revue Bénédictine for October, 1911 (tome xxviii. pp. 417-424), Dom Morin has receded from the position taken up in his Oxford Lectures, and he is now inclined to assign the Quicumque to S. Caesarius of Arles.]