PUSEY

saying you will not, I know, think it obtrusive if I write to you upon a matter which seems to concern you & not me, but which does concern us both in the same way only, as it affects our Church, and you will be assured that I wish only to give you information, which perhaps you do not possess... It relates to Ockeby & Mgt Chap. I ought to say at once, to you, altho' you probably are aware of it, that my own line is different from his in that I receive exclusively what was to us from centuries to which our Church guides us... he accepts the authority of the Roman Church. I ought to say so much to clear myself, & I may add that as he knows, I have watched with anxiety his life these many years, & he has, at times, allowed us to have influence with him. I do believe that notwithstanding his late letter to Mr V.C. for which I am exceedingly sorry, his wish has been and is, whenever he can do it without what seems to him compromise of conscience, to meet & give way to the views of others, who have the same object as himself of restoring our Church on the great common principles, alto' objecting to what is peculiar to the modern Church of Rome. His turn of mind & language are very different from that of Ward's. It is too, surely a very important distinction which he makes between holding & touching certain doctrines. Mgt Land certainly allows a very great... as to what a person may hold in our Church, provided he does not touch it. And when I have been at May Chapel, (& I have heard the same from others) I have been much impressed by the solid... simplicity of his sermons, keeping entirely aloff from every subject of controversy, but building up his congregation in the love & fear of God. There was an entire absence of anything which could give offence at the same time, people could not but go away impressed... he continues about Roman doctrines and the Church and carries on However I did not mean to occupy your time with my discussion, but to speak of what I know of the actual state of our Church. You, probably, also feel that it is in a very critical state, but you, probably, have no idea to what an extent people's minds are shaken, everywhere. They are not persons here, or who have any connection with this place, but everywhere, young woman as much as men, mothers of families, so that if anything should happen to perceptive people, there is no idea of the distress & division... It looks like Egypt after they last plague 'not a house to which there is not one lost to us'. And what has shaken them so much, has been these one-sided attacks... the sacraments are publicly denied by a large body of Clergy... blow follows blow, confusion upon confusion, until people are quite bewildered & begin to apply the words we heard today 's house divided...' Our only hope, as a Church, of weathering this dreadful storm, seems to be quick; you have no idea who or how many might be sent from us, or when it begins... Day by day is more distressing to me..., 4 sides 8vo., no place, no date