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Memoirs of James Robert Hope Scott, Volume 2

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Yours ever truly,

James R. Hope.

On November 25 we find Mr. Hope at Milan, where he mentions having seen his
old acquaintances, Manzoni and Vitali. The following letter will show how
much he had impressed the former, brief as their communications had been:--


_Alessandro Manzoni to J. R. Hope, Esq._

Milan: 8 Mai, 1845.

Monsieur et respectable ami,--Je profite de l'occasion que me présente mon
ancien et intime ami, M. le Baron Trechi, pour me rappeler à votre bon
souvenir....

Agréez mes remercîments bien vifs et bien sincères pour les _Scripture
Prints_ que Mr. Lewis Gruner a bien voulu me remettre de votre part. Si
le nom du peintre n'y était pas, je suis sûr qu'en les voyant, je me serais
écrié: Ah! Raphael. C'est tout ce qu'un homme n'ayant, malheureusement,
aucune connaissance de l'art, peut vous dire pour vous rendre compte de
l'impression que lui a faite la copie. Je ne vous charge de rien pour M.
Gladstone, parce que je me donne la satisfaction de lui écrire par cette
même occasion. J'espère que nous le reverrons bientôt au ministère. N'allez
pas me demander si je suis anglais pour dire: nous; car je vous répondrais
que _homo sum; humani nihil a me alienum puto_; et qu'il n'y a rien
d'_humanius_ que d'aimer à voir le pouvoir uni à la confiance; je ne
dis pas: à de hautes facultés; car, malheureusement, le cas est moins rare.
[After giving his friend an account of a great family affliction he had
sustained in the loss of a beloved daughter, the writer goes on to say:]

Je ne crains pas de vous importuner en vous parlant ainsi de ce qui me
touche si profondément: je sais la part que vous prenez à tout ce qui est
douleur et confiance en Dieu, par Jésus Christ. Je n'ai pas craint non plus
de vous choquer en vous écrivant avec un ton si familier, et comme il
conviendrait à une ancienne connaissance; car il me semble que nous le
sommes; l'affection et l'estime de ma part et une grande bonté de la vôtre,
ont bien pu suppléer le temps. Permettez-moi d'espérer que le bonheur que
j'ai de vous connaître n'aura pas été un accident dans une vie, et que des
causes plus heureuses que d'autrefois vous ramèneront bientôt encore dans
ce pays; et, en attendant, veuillez me garder une petite place dans votre
faveur, comme vous êtes toujours vivant dans le mien. Je suis, avec la plus
affectueuse considération,

Votre dévoué serviteur et ami,

ALEXANDRE MANZONI.

Mr. Hope proceeded from Milan to Florence and Rome. Almost the only letter
referring to this visit to Rome that has come before me is one written to
Mr. Badeley on December 19. It contains very little of importance. Much of
it is taken up with an account of Sir William Follett, then at Rome, and
verging towards his end, of whom Mr. Hope had seen a great deal. Other
friends named are Mr. and Mrs. Vivian, and Mr. Waterton. From the latter,
Mr. Hope had 'an interesting account of Tickell's reception into the Church
of Rome at Bruges. He was himself present, and very much struck by T.'s
devout and humble behaviour.'

'Of the Roman clergy,' Mr. Hope remarks, 'I have seen little, and have
indeed almost given up my inquiries among them.' He mentions in the same
letter that he intended leaving Rome on January 1 or 2, 'and to speed
homewards _viâ_ Leghorn, Genoa, Marseilles, and Paris.' Amidst all
this apparent coldness, and in spite of all the expressions of
disappointment with Rome that have appeared thus far, [Footnote: On the
cause of this dissatisfaction an intimate friend of his has observed: 'For
myself I think the real and sufficient reason of his disappointment with
Rome was, that the Roman authorities naturally and reasonably would not
open to a Protestant. They would fear their information would be used
against them. They could not know his honesty of purpose.'] it is clear
that the secret influence and spirit of the place were working their effect
on his mind. A great proof of this will be given further on, in a letter of
the Père Roothaan's to a friend relative to Mr. Hope's conversion.

A sentence from a letter of Mr. Hope's about two years afterwards is here
in point. 'Your impression of Rome (he writes to Mr. Badeley, October 16,
1847) appears to be similar to that of most who see it for the first time;
but it grows upon one, and the recollection will be deeper than the present
feeling.'

There is a pleasing note to Mr. Hope, dated December 20, 1844, from Mgr.
Grant, then Rector of the English College at Rome, and afterwards the well-
known Bishop of Southwark, one of the most beloved and venerated friends of
his Catholic period. It merely gives information to assist him in visiting
St. John Lateran's, and promises to send an order for St. Peter's. It
concludes characteristically: 'I shall be too happy to serve you whenever I
can be useful. Although you do not think so, you will find that _little
people_ are not without some use; and, in the hope that you will allow
me an opportunity of proving that I am in the right, I remain, with many
thanks for your kindness, &c.,--THOMAS GRANT.' I may here also give a short
letter of Bishop Grant's, of later date, illustrating their friendship, and
including some traces of its beginning at Rome:--

_The Right Rev. Dr. Grant, Bishop of Southwark, to J. R. Hope-Scott,
Esq., Q.C._

June 23, 1853.

My dear Mr. Hope-Scott,--The _frescoes_ have arrived, and I hasten to
thank you for a gift, valuable in itself, but most dear to me, because it
will ever remind me of the beginning of that friendship which has always
been so pleasing to me, and which forms one of the consolations that are
allowed to me in the midst of the weighty duties of my present state--
duties which I little expected when we quarrelled peacefully about Swiss
guards and troops of soldiers lining St. Peter's on grand days.

When you next visit the churches and antiquities of Rome, Mary Monica will
catch up the ardour that will then probably have gone by for you and
myself, and will wonder why you care so little for them; and if I am with
you I fear I shall be more tempted to tell her of the quiet rooms in Via
della Croce, when I first knew her father, than of the Arch of Drusus, or
other pagan monuments that once entertained our attention.

Yours very sincerely,

† THOMAS GRANT.

Mr. Hope-Scott had a high admiration for this saintly Bishop, and used to
speak of him as '_the_ Bishop,' always meaning by that Bishop Grant.

Early in 1845, and not many weeks after his return to England, Mr. Hope
resigned his chancellorship of Salisbury. It can scarcely be doubted that
misgivings as to his religious position, more apparent perhaps to us now
than they then were even to himself, were among his leading motives for
taking this important step; although the immense accumulation of his
business before the Parliamentary committees must have rendered it
difficult for him, even with his talents, to hold with it an appointment
like that in such times; and feelings of friendship for his successor, the
present Sir Robert Phillimore, may also have influenced him. The date of
the resignation was Feb. 10.

The judgment of Sir Herbert Jenner Fust in the celebrated 'Stone Altar
Case,' by which wooden altars only were permitted, was a severe
discouragement to the Tractarian party, being felt to interfere with the
idea of sacrifice. From the following passage of a letter (undated) of Dr.
Pusey's to Mr. Hope, it appears that he (Mr. Hope) had endeavoured to take
a more favourable view. The letter probably belongs to Feb. or March 1845.

I do not know whether the opinion you give is as to law previous to Sir H.
J. F.'s decision, and as a ground of appeal against it, or as to what would
still be allowed. Would his judgment preclude our having a stone slab,
either upon stone pedestals or a wooden panelled altar? I have comforted
others with the same topic you mention, that wooden tables are altars by
virtue of ye sacrifice, and so that this decision really alters nothing.
Still, it does seemingly, and was intended to discountenance the
doctrine.... It must be confessed, too, that this decision of Sir H. J. F.
is a defeat--only an outward one, and availing nothing while truth spreads
within. Still it is well to neutralise the sentence as much as we can.

Ever yrs affectly,

E. B. PUSEY.

Notwithstanding this, Mr. Hope is remembered, after the adverse decision,
to have despondingly asked, 'Where is the use of fighting for the shell
when we have lost the kernel?'

Among the other agitations of that time was the prosecution instituted in
the Court of Arches by Dr. Blomfield, Bishop of London, against the Rev.
Frederick Oakeley (the late Canon) for views which he had expressed about
the Blessed Sacrament. Canon Oakeley, in a conversation I had with him in
1878, gave me the following information as to the part taken by Mr. Hope as
his friend and adviser in this case, and general recollections of him. He
had resolved to let the case go by default, partly because he felt
convinced that it was sure to be decided in favour of the Bishop, as those
cases always were; partly because he disliked a subject like the Blessed
Sacrament to be bandied about by the lawyers in that way. Mr. Hope, on the
other hand, urged him to place himself in the hands of counsel, and thought
a good case might be made by reference to books on canon law and Roman
writers of the moderate school (Gallican), showing that, in point of fact,
the holding of 'all Roman doctrine' (thus interpreted) was compatible with
the doctrine of the Church of England. [Footnote: _Thus interpreted_,
observe. Mr. Newman himself, in a letter to Mr. Hope, dated Littlemore, May
14, 1845, says: 'You are quite right in saying I do not take Ward and
Oakeley's grounds that all Roman doctrine may be held in our Church, and
that _as_ Roman I have always and everywhere resisted it.'] The
principle on which he went was the approximation made out by Sancta Clara
and in Tract 90. Mr. Hope had more hopes of the House of Lords than of the
Court of Arches, and wished Mr. Oakeley to appeal to the former. If he was
afraid of the expenses, he said they would manage all that for him.
[Footnote: Mr. Hope had formed a committee (in conjunction with Serjeant
Bellasis, Mr. Badeley, and Mr. J. D. Chambers) in order to raise
contributions to meet Mr. Oakeley's expenses. I find an exchange of notes
dated March 10, 1845, between Mr. Hope and Mr. Gladstone on this matter.
Mr. Hope encloses a circular, and invites Mr. Gladstone to contribute,
remarking 'As the process must throw light upon many collateral points, I
amongst others am much interested in its being well conducted. I am,
moreover, as a friend of O.'s, anxious that he should have fair
play....This looks like the beginning of the end.' Mr. Gladstone, in reply,
alludes to doubts he had had whether he could subscribe _in re_ Ward.
'Although I am far from having (upon a slight consideration as yet, for I
have been very busy with other matters) found them conclusive; for I think
we are going to try questions of academical right, and even of general
justice.' He therefore declines subscribing in Mr. Oakeley's case,
promising to give Mr. Hope his reasons whenever they should meet.]He added,
however, 'But I think you are inclined to go over to the Church of Rome;
and if that is the case, it is useless to proceed.' Mr. Hope at that time
(said the Canon) was a staunch Anglican. He did not, however, see more of
him than of any other member of his congregation perhaps once in three
months. After Mr. Oakeley had become a Catholic, Mr. Hope once asked him to
breakfast, which he accepted rather hesitatingly. At that time he (Mr.
Oakeley) thought less favourably of Protestants than he did now, and hinted
that he must take a line in conversation that might not be acceptable. Mr.
Hope said they need not talk of that, let him come. At this breakfast Mr.
Hope mentioned that he had been lately at Rome (he could allude to no other
visit than that of 1844-5), where he had seen a procession of the Pope in
the _sedia gestatoria_, and thought how much better it would have been
if he had walked in the procession like any other Bishop--that was the line
he took. [I ought to add that, later in my conversation with him, Canon
Oakeley seemed rather to hesitate whether it was Mr. Hope or some one else
who made this observation about the Pope's procession, but in the end he
appeared to feel satisfied that it was Mr. Hope.]

In the same troubled spring of 1845 a movement was going on to assimilate
the office of the Scottish Episcopalian Church to that of the English. Dean
Ramsay of Edinburgh had asked Mr. Hope for a legal opinion on a case in
which he was concerned bearing on this. Mr. Hope, in a letter to him dated
April 8, declines to meddle with the question, and adds:--

I can hardly tell you how much I deprecate any steps which may tend to
diminish the authority of the _native_ office; how entirely I dissent
from any plans of further assimilation to the foreign English Church.
Indeed, the consequences of such schemes at this moment would in my opinion
be most disastrous.

Some letters of great interest with reference to Mr. Hope's religious
position at this period occur in the Gladstone correspondence. Mr.
Gladstone, being now thoroughly aware that his friend was entertaining
serious doubts as to the Catholicity of the Church of England, writes him a
very long and deeply considered letter, appealing in the first place to a
promise of co-operation which Mr. Hope had made him in the earlier days of
their friendship, and placing before him, with all the power and eloquence
of which he is so great a master, what he regarded as the most unanswerable
arguments for remaining in the Anglican communion. From this letter I quote
the following passages as strictly biographical:--

_The Right Hon. W. E. Gladstone, M.P. to J. M. Hope, Esq._

13 Carlton House Terrace: Thursday night, May 15, '45.

_Private._

My dear Hope,--In 1838 you lent me that generous and powerful aid in the
preparation of my book for the press, to which I owe it that the defects
and faults of the work fell short of absolutely disqualifying it for its
purpose. From that time I began to form not only high but definite
anticipations of the services which you would render to the Church in the
deep and searching processes through which she has passed and yet has to
pass. These anticipations, however, did not rest only upon my own wishes,
or on the hopes which benefits already received might have led me to form.
In the commencement of 1840, in the very room where we talked to-night, you
voluntarily and somewhat solemnly tendered to me the assurance that you
would at all times be ready to co-operate with me in furtherance of the
welfare of the Church, and you placed no limit upon the extent of such co-
operation. I had no title to expect and had not expected a promise so
heart-stirring, but I set upon it a value scarcely to be described, and it
ever after entered as an element of the first importance into all my views
of the future course of public affairs in their bearing upon religion.
[Footnote: With this may be compared Mr. Hope's letter to Mr. Gladstone of
October 11, 1838, given in chapter ix. (vol. i.).]

* * * * *

If the time shall ever come (which I look upon as extremely uncertain, but
I think if it comes at all it will be before the lapse of many years) when
I am called upon to use any of those opportunities [the writer had just
spoken of 'the great opportunities, the gigantic opportunities of good or
evil to the Church which the course of events seems (humanly speaking)
certain to open up'], it would be my duty to look to you for aid, under the
promise to which I have referred, unless in the meantime you shall as
deliberately and solemnly withdraw that promise as you first made it. I
will not describe at length how your withdrawal of it would increase that
sense of desolation which, as matters now stand, often approaches to being
intolerable. I only speak of it as a matter of fact, and I am anxious you
should know that I look to it as one of the very weightiest kind, under a
title which you have given me. You would of course cancel it upon the
conviction that it involved sin upon your part: with anything less than
that conviction I do not expect that you will cancel it; and I am, on the
contrary, persuaded that you will struggle against pain, depression,
disgust, and even against doubt touching the very root of our position, for
the fulfilment of any actual _duties_ which the post you actually
occupy in the Church of God, taken in connection with your faculties and
attainments, may assign to you.

You have given me lessons that I have taken thankfully. Believe I do it in
the payment of a debt, if I tell you that your mind and intellect, to which
I look up with reverence under a consciousness of immense inferiority, are
much under the dominion, whether it be known or not known to yourself, of
an agency lower than their own, more blind, more variable, more difficult
to call inwardly to account and make to answer for itself--the agency, I
mean, of painful and disheartening impressions--impressions which have an
unhappy and powerful tendency to realise the very worst of what they
picture. Of this fact I have repeatedly noted the signs in you.

I should have been glad to have got your advice on some points connected
with the Maynooth question on Monday next, but I will not introduce here
any demand upon your kindness; the claims of this letter on your attention,
be they great or small, and you are their only judge, rest upon wholly
different grounds.

God bless and guide you, and prosper the work of your hands.

Ever your aff'te friend, W. E. GLADSTONE.

J. R. Hope, Esq.

The friends both being in London at the time, the correspondence gives no
further light at this point. In July Mr. Gladstone proposed to Mr. Hope
that they two should go on a tour in Ireland together. The invitation must
be given in his own words:--

_The Right Hon. W. E. Gladstone, M.P. to J. R. Hope, Esq._

13 C. H. Terrace: July 23, 1845.

My dear Hope,--Ireland is likely to find this country and Parliament so
much employment for years to come, that I feel rather oppressively an
obligation to try and see it with my own eyes instead of using those of
other people, according to the limited measure of my means.

Now your company would be so very valuable as well as agreeable to me, that
I am desirous to know whether you are at all inclined to entertain the idea
of devoting the month of September, after the meeting in Edinburgh, to a
working tour in Ireland with me--eschewing all grandeur, and taking little
account even of scenery, compared with the purpose of looking from close
quarters at the institutions for religion and education of the country, and
at the character of the people. It seems ridiculous to talk of supplying
the defects of second-hand information by so short a trip; but though a
longer time would be much better, yet even a very contracted one does much
when it is added to an habitual though indirect knowledge.

Believe me Your attached friend, W. E. GLADSTONE.

It is much to be regretted that this tour was not accomplished, but various
engagements prevented Mr. Hope's accepting the invitation: he spent that
part of the vacation in Scotland, and Mr. Gladstone on the Continent.
Shortly after the date of the preceding letter Mr. Gladstone appears to
have suggested to Mr. Hope the idea of his joining some association for
active charity, which is partly illustrated by a correspondence which I
shall presently quote; but Mr. Hope (August 6) writes:--

As to the guild or confraternity, I am not at this moment prepared to join
it. My reasons are various, but I have not had leisure to think them out.
When I have revolved the matter further, perhaps I may trouble you again
upon it.

On October 9, 1845, Mr. Newman was received into the Catholic Church, and
Mr. Hope writes to him on the 20th:--

I was so fully prepared that the event fell lightly on my mind, but the
feeling of separation has since grown upon me painfully. The effect which,
I think I told you, it would have upon my conduct, is that of forcing me to
a deliberate inquiry; but I feel most unfit for it, and look with anxiety
to your book as my guide. I hope to be at Oxford early next week, and trust
to see you. Meantime, if it be anything to you to know that all my personal
feelings towards you remain unaltered, or rather, are deepened, that much I
can sincerely say.

On December 1 he speaks of his own joining the Roman Catholic Church as
'what may eventually happen,' adding: 'But I feel that I have yet much
before me, both in moral and intellectual exertion, ere I can hope for a
conclusion. Meantime I beg your prayers.'

On December 22 he gives his impressions of Newman's 'Essay on Development,'
so eagerly expected:--

I have read your book _once_ through. To apprehend it fully will
require one, if not two more perusals. The effect produced upon me as yet
is that of perplexity at seeing how wide a range of thought appears to be
required for the discussion. I had thought that the principles which I
already acknowledge would, upon a careful application, suffice for the
solution of the difficulties; but you have taken me into a region less
familiar to me, and the extent of which makes me feel helpless and
discouraged.

It may be worth mentioning that soon after the 'Essay on Development' came
out, Mr. Hope asked a friend at dinner across the table (the anecdote was
given me by the latter), 'Have you read the "Extravagant of John"?' To
understand this, the unlearned reader must be told that certain celebrated
constitutions, decreed by Pope John XXII., are called by canonists the
'Extravagantes Joannis.' The play on the word was one which would be
relished by Mr. Hope's friend, who was almost as great a student of the
canon law as himself. His meaning, however, may have been that he thought
Mr. Newman had taken up a view outside of the received system.

In the two letters I have just quoted Mr. Hope enters, like a kind friend
and adviser, into Mr. Newman's plans in the early days of his conversion,
but an interruption of the correspondence seems to have followed on Mr.
Newman's going to Rome, where he was from autumn, 1846, to the beginning of
1848. It is probable, indeed, that it was the consciousness of his own
affection for Mr. Newman, and of Mr. Newman's influence over him, that led
Mr. Hope to abstain, during that long interval, from intercourse with a
friend whom he regarded with such deep respect and admiration. There is,
however, a letter of Mr. Newman's from Rome in the interval, which will be
read with great interest, both for his own history and for the light, yet
thrilling touch of spiritual kindness which it conveys towards the end. It
contains, too, a line explaining his own silence.

_The Rev. J. H. Newman to J. R. Hope, Esq_.

(Private.) Collegio di Prop.: Feb. 23, '47.

My dear Hope,--I have been writing so very, very much lately, that now that
I want to tell you something my hand is so tired that I can hardly write a
word. We are to be Oratorians. Mgr. Brunelli went to the Pope about it the
day before yesterday, my birthday. The Pope took up the plan most warmly,
as had Mgr. B., to whom we had mentioned it a month back. Mgr. had returned
my paper, in which I drew out my plan, saying, 'Mi piace immensamente,' and
repeated several times that the plan was 'ben ideata.' They have from the
first been as kind to us as possible, and are ever willing to do anything
for us. I have ever been thinking of you, and you must have thought my
silence almost unkind, but I waited to tell you something which would be
real news. It is _no_ secret that we are to be Oratorians, but matters
of detail being uncertain, you had better keep it to yourself. The Pope
wishes us to come here, as many as can, form a house under an experienced
Oratorian Father, go through a novitiate, and return. Of course they will
hasten us back as soon as [they] can, but that will depend on our progress.
I _suppose_ we shall set up in Birmingham... You are not likely to
know the very Jesuits of Propaganda. We are very fortunate in them. The
Rector (Padre Bresciani) is a man of great delicacy and real kindness; our
confessor, Father Ripetti, is one of the most excellent persons we have
fallen in with, tho' I can't describe him to you in a few words. Another
person we got on uncommonly with was Ghianda at Milan. Bellasis will have
told you about him. We owed a great deal to you there, and did not forget
you, my dear Hope. Let me say it, O that God would give you the gift of
faith! Forgive me for this. I know you will. It is of no use my plaguing
you with many words. I want you for the Church in England, and the Church
for you. But I must do my own work in my own place, and leave everything
else to that inscrutable Will which we can but adore;... Well, our lot is
fixed. What will come to it I know not. Don't think me ambitious. I am not.
I have no views. It will be enough for me if I get into some active work,
and save my own soul.... My affectionate remembrances to Badeley....

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