, nor, I may say, thought of taking a number with me. But
nothing of this could be known to others.

The following three letters are written to a friend, who had every
claim upon me to be frank with him:--it will be seen that I disclose
the real state of mind to him, in proportion as he presses me.

1. "October 14, 1843. I would tell you in a few words why I have
resigned St. Mary's, as you seem to wish, were it possible to do so.
But it is most difficult to bring out in brief, or even _in extenso_,
any just view of my feelings and reasons.

"The nearest approach I can give to a general account of them is to
say, that it has been caused by the general repudiation of the view,
contained in No. 90, on the part of the Church. I could not stand
against such an unanimous expression of opinion from the Bishops,
supported, as it has been, by the concurrence, or at least silence,
of all classes in the Church, lay and clerical. If there ever was a
case, in which an individual teacher has been put aside and virtually
put away by a community, mine is one. No decency has been observed in
the attacks upon me from authority; no protests have been offered
against them. It is felt,--I am far from denying, justly felt,--that
I am a foreign material, and cannot assimilate with the Church of
England.

"Even my own Bishop has said that my mode of interpreting the
Articles makes them mean _anything or nothing_. When I heard this
delivered, I did not believe my ears. I denied to others that it was
said.... Out came the charge, and the words could not be mistaken.
This astonished me the more, because I published that Letter to him
(how unwillingly you know) on the understanding that _I_ was to
deliver his judgment on No. 90 _instead_ of him. A year elapses, and
a second and heavier judgment came forth. I did not bargain for
this,--nor did he, but the tide was too strong for him.

"I fear that I must confess, that, in proportion as I think the
English Church is showing herself intrinsically and radically alien
from Catholic principles, so do I feel the difficulties of defending
her claims to be a branch of the Catholic Church. It seems a dream to
call a communion Catholic, when one can neither appeal to any clear
statement of Catholic doctrine in its formularies, nor interpret
ambiguous formularies by the received and living Catholic sense,
whether past or present. Men of Catholic views are too truly but a
party in our Church. I cannot d