IT is not unusual with those who are more anxious to make difficulties than to understand the Catholic truth, to speak of the “vagueness of the rule of S. Vincent,” and the arduousness of the task imposed by the Doctors of the _Via Media_ on all their scholars. That it is easy enough to construct a theoretical difficulty of this sort, no one will question. But it behoves every Christian to consider well, whether any “dilemmas of Churchmen” can be stated which might not (without any very great ingenuity) be turned into ‘Dilemmas of CHRISTIANS.’ Doubtless it is a _trial_, (and GOD intended it to be so, 1 Cor. xi. 19.) to see so many diversities and divisions in the Church; yet candid judges will hardly decide, that English Churchmen have more difficulties of this kind than other men; or that we should be likely to escape similar “dilemmas” by forsaking the CHURCH for any other community. And in spite of the ingenuity of men, common sense will generally understand the practical use and application of S. Vincent’s rule, “Quod semper,” &c. An instance of the ordinary manner of its practical employment, may be seen, to a certain extent, in Lecture II. p. 51, and will suggest at once to the minds of many, the way in which the English Churchman can and does proceed. Difficult as the theory of the Via Media, and the popular recognition of truth by S. Vincent’s test may in theory be made to seem; yet it is, I imagine, practically and as a matter of experience acted on, to a much wider extent, both in our own Church and the _Roman_, than is commonly noticed, or thought of. In illustration, the twenty-first chapter of St. Luke might be advantageously consulted. Our LORD there assumes (what in fact is daily seen) that heresies should arise. And He tells His people not to follow the “Lo here is CHRIST!” and “Lo there!” Of course it might always be easy to say—which is THE CHURCH?—and, which is the heresy?—The “Lo here!” But that is a difficulty which our LORD did _not_ entertain. It has very little existence in fact and experience. Every man, generally speaking, knows whether he is in “the Church.” Though, of course, there is such a thing as a “strong delusion;” (2 Thess. ii. 11.) The whole of our LORD’S address in this chapter is one which the Catholic Church _feels_ the power of. It is full of “_difficulty_,” and “uncertainty, and vagueness,” to Sectarians only, who have no test whereby they can be sure that they are not the very persons aimed at by our LORD, as following false and _new_ teachers. It seems to me, that the Sectarian _cannot_ act upon CHRIST’S directions in this chapter. Nay they _must_ have, to him, all the vagueness and uncertainty which he charges on the Catholic rule. “Keep to the ancient Apostolic way; mind not novelties; ‘Go not after them.’ Keep to the ‘Quod semper, quod ubique, quod ab omnibus,’ in opposition to every ‘Lo here is Christ!’” IV.