That his life is for the most part a record of sadness and failure is no
indication that he was not one of the great men of his time.
Independence is no passport to success in a world where, as Swift said,
climbing and crawling are performed in much the same attitude. And if we
are right in our view that there was something in the composition of his
mind which prevented him from being either a complete Catholic or a
complete Protestant, this too is no obstacle to our recognition of his
greatness. He has left an indelible mark upon two great religious
bodies. He has stirred movements which still agitate the Church of
England and the Church of Rome, and the end of which is not yet in
sight. Anglo-Catholicism and Modernism are alien growths, perhaps, in
the institutions where they have found a place; but the man who beyond
all others is responsible for grafting them upon the old stems is secure
of his place in history.
FOOTNOTES:
[82] Cf. e. _Parochial and Plain Sermons_, vi. 259.
[83] Mark Pattison, _Memoirs_, p. 97.
[84] _Stray Essays_, p. 94.
[85] _Parochial and Plain Sermons_, v. 112.
[86] _Ibid_. vi. 259.
[87] _Ibid_. vi. 340.
[88] _Grammar of Assent_, part i. c. 1 and 2.
[89] _Parochial and Plain Sermons_, vii. 73.
ST. PAUL
(1914)
Among all the great men of antiquity there is none, with the exception
of Cicero, whom we may know so intimately as Saul of Tarsus. The main
facts of his career have been recorded by a contemporary, who was
probably his friend and travelling companion. A collection of letters,
addressed to the little religious communities which he founded, reveals
the character of the writer no less than the nature of his work. Alone
among the first preachers of Christianity, he stands before us as a
living man. Ohiost phepnytai, toi de skiai hahissoysi. We know very
little in reality of Peter and James and John, of Apollos and Barnabas.
And of our divine Master no biography can ever be written.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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