Cardinal Newman: Life and letters

Press, 25 June 1983, Page 18

Cardinal Newman: Life and letters

Newman. By Owen Chadwick. Oxford U.P., 1983. 83 pp. $5.95 (paperback). A Packet of Letters: A selection from the correspondence of John Henry Newman. Edited by Joyce Sugg. Oxford U.P., 1983. 230 pp. $23.25.

(Reviewed by

Colin Brown)

John Henry Newman was unfavourably regarded by many of his comtemporaries. Thomas Carlyle was contemptuous of Newman’s intellectual abilities: he was accused of dissembling hyposcrisy by Charles Kingsley. Newman was, too, the victim of spite and distrust on the part of both Anglicans and Roman Catholics. To his own satisfaction Newman outlived most of this: his Oxford college made him an honorary fellow, the Pope made him a cardinal, and his Anglican friends of earlier years renewed acquaintance with him. Out of Newman’s personal dilemma whether to leave the Church of England for the Roman Catholic Church came the perceptive but wayward “Essay on the Development of Christian Doctrine” ana, in responding to Kingsley’s accusation, Newman wrote his famous “Apologia Pro Vita Sua.” In addition he wrote original treatises on the role of faith and reason in belief, and on university education. He was a great preacher (not a popular one — that is another matter), and a crucial figure in altering the character of both Anglicanism and Roman Catholicism. His theological influence, moreover, has extended well beyond the nineteenth century and England. There is, then, ample justification for including Newman in this series of “Past Masters” and Owen Chadwick is well-equipped to write about him. Chadwick is the author of a major study of Newman’s essay on doctrinal development, has edited an anthology of writings by the first generation of the Oxford Movement, and published two masssive volumes on the churches in Victorian England. Given the limitation of brevity the essay on Newman comes off quite well. The lecture-room style is, however, carried over into writing which does not always read smoothly and easily. Occasionally, too, characters and incidents flit across the pages without being adequately introduced. There are, nevertheless, some very good things packed into this brief study: what Newman meant by “liberalism” is explained with admirable succinctness. As might be expected from a historian whose major achievements relate almost exclusively to the nineteenth century, Chadwick does not extend his estimate of Newman’s influence beyond the

Victorian period. There is a brief but judicious bibliography. Newman, says Chadwick, “found it hard to write a dull letter” and Newman himself observed that “a man’s life lies in his letters.” The collected edition of Newman’s letters and diaries runs to 31 volumes, a marvellous resource for scholars, but over-powering for the general reader. There is, therefore, room for just such a collection as Joyce Sugg has edited. She has chosen 155 letters ranging over Newman’s lifetime and representing many of his moods, interests, and correspondents. To this collection she has added a short introduction, a summary of the main events in Newman’s life, helpful notes on some obscurities in the letters, and brief biographies of the correspondents concerned. Partly because she provides Newman’s side of the correspondence only, readers may not always grasp the full import of Newman’s meaning unless they have some prior knowledge of his life and writings. On the whole this selection does not misrepresent Newman; if anything, like Chadwick’s account, it brings out his more admirable characteristics. But the collection serves, too, to remind readers that Newman’s interests were limited: social reform did not interest him and there is little to document Chadwick’s claim that Newman read “many books.” Owen Chadwick’s essay and Joyce Sugg’s edited selection of letters are nicely complementary. Both serve to introduce readers to Newman and the letters provide a sampling of some of the evidence by which certain of Chadwick’s claims may be tested.