In placing before my fellow parishioners this publication, I think it necessary most distinctly to disavow any personal hostility to the Vicar, as an individual.
I feel it the more incumbent on me to say this, as my object is not so much to prove the errors and unscriptural teaching of the “Tractarians,” as to make it plain (by his own words and actions) that Dr. Irons must be considered as altogether identified with the “Tractarian” party.
On a fitting occasion, however, I shall be ready (the Lord enabling me) to shew, that the principles and practices of those clergymen who have unhappily embraced “Tractarian” error, are as contrary to God’s blessed Word as they are to the Articles of our Church; and that these principles (if honestly carried out) as necessarily lead to Rome, as a humble and prayerful study of the Bible, will assuredly lead the sincere enquirer into the light and liberty of Gospel truth.
It is the policy of the more wily amongst the “Tractarians” to keep aloof in some measure from the “Ultras” of their party, and to follow the Jesuitical advice given from a certain quarter, not to be over hasty in bringing in Anglican forms and observances amongst their congregations, but to win them over by little and little.
This policy will account for much that is going on in our parish, where we have a Vicar who says that he is not a Tractarian “in any sense.”
I feel assured that the parishioners of Brompton are not prepared for that open and undisguised “Tractarianism” practised in some of our churches; but when I bear in mind the fact, that during the past year two or three of the most noted amongst the “Tractarian” Clergy have been preaching in the Parish Church, it shews the necessity of being on our guard to resist the insidious attempts made from within, as well as the endeavours now making from without, to bring us into the bondage of “Tractarianism,” or into the more open and unadulterated principles and practices of Romanism. It may be well for us to remember that at the recent opening of the Popish Institution (the Oratory) in our Parish, there were reported as being present twelve Romish priests or laymen, who until the last few years were clergymen of the Established Church, and belonging to the “Tractarian” party.
In making use of the word “Tractarian” a necessity has been laid upon me, for though I deprecate the use of party names, I know of no other term (not even Puseyism) that would so distinctly point out the principles which have led to such melancholy results to the Church of England.
We must not however suppose these principles are in themselves new; they are as old as the earliest ages of Christianity. The Galatian Converts were seduced from the simplicity of the Gospel by them; and coming down to the days of Charles the First, our own Church has great cause to lament the progress they made at that unhappy period.
I am the more solicitous that this should not be lost sight of, as Dr. Irons says his own views “were not obtained from the Oxford Tracts.” This is very possible, but has nothing to do with the fact, that the Reverend Doctor holds substantially all the errors of the “Tractarians.”
That the principles of sound Protestanism still prevailing in this neighbourhood, combined with the faithful preaching of the gospel in many of our churches and chapels, may by God’s blessing be an effectual bulwark against the covert, as well as against the open, enemies of our time-honoured Church, is my earnest prayer.