A history of the University of Oxford

by George C. Brodrick

The great Neo-Catholic Revival of the nineteenth century is so intimately identified with Oxford that it came to be widely known as the ‘Oxford Movement.’ It was less important than Methodism in its purely moral aspect, since it was far less popular and practical, leaving no such profound impression upon the religious life of the nation. On the other hand, it exercised a more powerful influence on Anglican theology, since it wore a more scholarlike garb, was more attractive to cultivated and imaginative minds, allied itself with the speculative and historical spirit of the age, and purported to be essentially constructive or reconstructive. It had from the first a centre, and solid base of operations, in the University, with branches stretching far and wide, wherever zealous Churchmen were found. The assaults of Methodism upon religious apathy in high places had been more in the nature of guerilla warfare; those of ‘Tractarianism,’ as it came to be called, assumed the character of a well-organised campaign.

A reaction against the rising tide of Liberalism

Whatever may have been the aims of its leaders, the Oxford Movement was in truth a reaction, and its real origin must be sought in political rather than in ecclesiastical causes. The question of Catholic Emancipation, which had been stifled at the Union, was revived in 1812 and fiercely debated for the next seventeen years. The measure was equally opposed by the High and Low Church parties in the Church, but carried in 1829 by a Tory Government in deference to political exigencies. It was followed by the Reform Act, and in 1832 the reformed Parliament assembled, with a large majority, not merely Erastian, but hostile to the National Church. The vote of the bishops on the Reform Bill had exposed them to popular obloquy; Lord Grey himself had openly threatened them, and the press was full of attacks on Episcopacy and the Establishment. Lord Grey’s Act for suppressing ten Irish bishoprics was regarded as the first outburst of the gathering storm; timid Churchmen trembled for the very existence of their Church, and the Oxford Movement was set on foot with the deliberate purpose of defending the Church and the Christianity of England against the anti-Catholic aggressions of the dominant Liberalism.

Oriel the centre of the Movement

The University of Oxford was the natural centre for such a reaction. The constitution of the University and colleges was semi-ecclesiastical; the Heads were clerical dignitaries; nearly all the fellows were bound to be in Holy Orders. Among the colleges, Oriel then held the first rank, both as a place of education, and as the home of a speculative and learned society among the fellows. Copleston, its last Provost, had been a man of remarkable capacity, and he was ably seconded by such colleagues as Davison and Whately. The system of tuition at Oriel was the best in Oxford, and as it was the first college to throw open its fellowships, it was able to attract the ablest of the young graduates. It was known that Oriel fellows were selected not merely on the evidence of the class-list, or by the results of competitive examination, but also by a discriminating, though arbitrary, estimate of their social qualities and probable intellectual development. They were, therefore, a select body, somewhat inclined to mutual admiration, producing little, but freely criticising everything. The result was an Oriel school of thought, commonly known as the Noetics, who applied an unsparing logic to received opinions, especially those concerning religious faith, but whose strength lay rather in drawing inferences and refuting fallacies than in examining and settling the premisses from which their syllogisms were deduced. Still, Oriel fostered a bright and independent intellectual life of its own; the Oriel school was a standing protest against the prevailing orthodoxy of mere conformity, and it became the congenial head-quarters of the Oxford Movement.

John Henry Newman

Pusey and Keble were among the fellows of Oriel, when John Henry Newman was elected to a fellowship in 1823, and later, in 1826, became tutor in succession to Jelf. Newman’s early life at Oxford was a solitary one. He did not seek friends, and in the Oriel common-room his shy and retiring nature sometimes concealed his real power. As Wesley’s sympathies were originally with High Church doctrines, so Newman’s were originally with Evangelical doctrines; he was connected with the Evangelical set at St. Edmund Hall; he was for a time secretary to the Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge, and he actually helped to start the ‘Record’ newspaper. In the early development of his ideas he owed much to the robust intellect of Whately and the accurate criticism of Hawkins, who succeeded Copleston as Provost in 1827. But his reverence was reserved for Keble, whose ‘Christian Year’ appeared in the same year and gave the first secret impulse to the Movement, of which Newman became the head. In the following year, Pusey, then little known to Newman, returned to Oxford as Professor of Hebrew and Canon of Christchurch, unconsciously destined to give his own name to Newman’s followers.

Origin of ‘Tracts for the Times’

At this period Newman had no intention of heading the Oxford Movement, still less of founding a new party in the Church. His Evangelical principles were gradually falling away from him, and he was girding himself up for a great struggle with Secularism as represented by a Liberal Government, but the first steps in the Tractarian agitation were not taken by him. In 1832 he travelled in Italy with his friend and pupil, Richard Hurrell Froude; and it was from him that Newman imbibed his veneration for the Virgin and the Saints, his antipathy to the Reformation, and his respectful toleration of the Roman Catholic Church. They went so far as to inquire upon what conditions they would be allowed to communicate in that Church, but were repelled on hearing that a subscription to the decisions of the Council of Trent would be required. It was during Newman’s absence abroad, in July 1833, that Keble preached his Assize Sermon on ‘National Apostasy,’ which may be said to have struck the first note of the Movement, and in the same year Peter Maurice sounded the alarm against ‘Popery in Oxford.’ A series of ‘Tracts for the Times’ was projected at a conference, also held during Newman’s absence, by a small body of his friends, but the plan was matured at subsequent conferences in Oriel, where Newman was present, and Keble warmly supported it in letters of advice to which the utmost deference was paid. The proposed aim of these Tracts was expository rather than controversial; they purported to enlighten the prevailing ignorance on Church principles and Church history. They were to appear anonymously, and each writer was to be responsible only for his own production. The difficulty of maintaining this principle of limited liability was foreseen from the first, and prudent friends of the Movement were in favour of a judicious censorship, but Newman was inflexible, and his will prevailed.

Association formed