doctrinally jealous
of Popery, and of anything "unsound" in that direction, had been roused
to increased irritation by the proceedings of the Reformation Society,
which had made it its business to hold meetings and discussions all over
the country, where fervid and sometimes eloquent and able Irishmen, like
Mr. E. Tottenham, afterwards of Laura Chapel, Bath, had argued and
declaimed, with Roman text-books in hand, on such questions as the Right
of Private Judgment, the Rule of Faith, and the articles of the
Tridentine Creed--not always with the effect which they intended on
those who heard them, with whom their arguments, and those which they
elicited from their opponents, sometimes left behind uncomfortable
misgivings, and questions even more serious than the controversy itself.
On the other hand, in quarters quite unconnected with the recognised
religious schools, interest had been independently and strongly awakened
in the minds of theologians and philosophical thinkers, in regard to the
idea, history, and relations to society of the Christian Church. In
Ireland, a recluse, who was the centre of a small knot of earnest
friends, a man of deep piety and great freedom and originality of mind,
Mr. Alexander Knox, had been led, partly, it may be, by his intimacy
with John Wesley, to think out for himself the character and true
constitution of the Church, and the nature of the doctrines which it was
commissioned to teach. In England, another recluse, of splendid genius
and wayward humour, had dealt in his own way, with far-reaching insight,
with vast reading, and often with impressive eloquence, with the same
subject; and his profound sympathy and faith had been shared and
reflected by a great poet. What Coleridge and Wordsworth had put in the
forefront of their speculations and poetry, as the object of their
profoundest interest, and of their highest hopes for mankind, might, of
course, fail to appear in the same light to others; but it could not
fail, in those days at least, to attract attention, as a matter of
grave and well-founded importance. Coleridge's theories of the Church
were his own, and were very wide of theories recognised by any of those
who had to deal practically with the question, and who were influenced,
in one way or another, by the traditional doctrines of theologians. But
Coleridge had lifted the subject to a very high level. He had taken the
simple but all-important step of viewing the Church in its sp