would be appealed to in both cases; those, namely, which teach or exemplify the duty of austere reserve towards wilful heretics, and earnest zeal against heresiarchs. Perhaps it may be found that [Mr. Froude’s] demeanour and language on such subjects is a tolerably striking and consistent illustration of that sentiment of the Psalmist: “Do not I hate them, O Lord, that hate Thee?” He hated them in their collective character, as God’s enemies, as the antichristian party; but to all who came in his way individually, he was, as many of his acquaintance can testify, full of unaffected, open-hearted kindness; entering into their feelings, and making allowance for their difficulties, not the less scrupulously because he sometimes found himself compelled to separate from them, or declare himself against them.
‘To judge adequately of this point, we must, further, take into account a certain strong jealousy which he entertained of his own honesty of mind. He was naturally, or on principle, a downright speaker, avoiding those words of course and of compliment, which often, it may be feared, serve to keep up a false peace at the expense of true Christian charity. His words, therefore (playfulness and occasional irony apart), may in general be taken more literally than those of most men. It is easy to see that this would make his criticisms, whether literary or moral, sound more pointed and unsparing than those in which a writer of less frankness would indulge himself. And this introduces another point, not unlikely to be animadverted on as blameable, in the present selection. Many, recoiling from his sentences, so direct, fearless, and pungent, concerning all sorts of men and things, will be fain to account them speeches uttered at random, more for present point and effect, than to declare the speaker’s real opinion; and, so judging, will of course disapprove of the collecting and publishing such sayings, especially on high and solemn subjects, as at best incautious, and perhaps irreverent. But they who judge thus must be met by a denial of the fact. The expressions in question were not uttered at random: he was not in the habit of speaking at random on such matters. This is remarkably evinced by the fact that to various friends, at various times, conversing or writing on the same subjects, he
was constantly employing the same illustrations and arguments, very often the same words: as they found by comparison afterwards, and still go on to find. Now maxims and reasonings of which this may be truly affirmed, whatever else may be alleged against them, cannot fairly be thrown by as mere chance sayings. Right or wrong, they were deliberate opinions, and cannot be left out of consideration, in a complete estimate of a writer’s character and principles. The off-hand unpremeditated way in which they seemed to dart out of him, like sparks from a luminous body, proved only a mind entirely possessed with the subject; glowing, as it were, through and through.
‘Still, some will say, more selection might have been used, and many statements at least omitted, which, however well considered by himself, coming now, suddenly, as they do, on the reader, appear unnecessarily startling and paradoxical. But, really, there was little option of that kind, if justice were to be done either to him or to the reader. His opinions had a wonderful degree of consistency and mutual bearing; they depended on each other as one whole: who was to take the responsibility of separating them? Who durst attempt it, considering especially his hatred of concealment and artifice? Again: it was due to the reader to show him fairly how far the opinions recommended would carry him. There is no wish to disguise their tendencies, nor to withdraw them from such examination as will prove them erroneous, if they are so. Any homage which it is desired to render to his memory would indeed be sadly tarnished, were he to be spoken or written of in any spirit but that of an unshrinking openness like his own. Such also is the tone of the Catholic Fathers, and (if it may be urged without irreverence), of the Sacred Writers themselves. Nothing, as far as we can find, is kept back by them, merely because it would prove startling: openness, not disguise, is their manner. This should not be forgotten in a compilation professing simply to recommend their principles. Nothing, therefore, is here kept back, but what it was judged would be fairly and naturally misunderstood: the insertion of which, therefore, would have been, virtually, so much untruth.
‘Lastly, it may perhaps be thought of the Correspondence in particular, that it is eked out with unimportant details, according to the usual mistake of partial friends. The compilers, however, can most truly affirm that they have had the risk of such an error continually before their eyes, and have not, to the best of their judgement, inserted anything, which did not tell, indirectly perhaps but really, towards filling up that outline of his mind and character, which seemed requisite to complete the idea of him as a witness to Catholic views. It can hardly be necessary for them to add, what the name of Editor implies, that while they, of course, concur in his sentiments as a whole, they are not to be understood as rendering themselves responsible for every shade of opinion or expression.
‘It remains only to commend these fragments, if it may be done without presumption, to the same good Providence which seemed to bless the example and instructions of the writer while yet with us, to the benefit of many who knew him: that “being dead,” he may “yet speak,” as he constantly desired to do, a word in season for the Church of God: may still have the privilege of awakening some of her members to truer and more awful thoughts than they now have, of their own high endowments and deep responsibility.’
‘Remains of the Rev. Richard Hurrell Froude, M.A., Fellow of Oriel’ [edited by the Rev. J. H. Newman and the Rev. John Keble]. London: Rivingtons, 1839. Part II.
‘It was of course impossible but that the quantity and variety of censure, which was elicited by the publication of the former part of these Remains, should be felt by the Editors as a call for much calm and patient consideration, before proceeding, in further fulfilment of their trust, to offer these additional volumes to the world. One thing has at least become evident, which was at first very uncertain: that it was a publication of some importance for good or for evil. The notice which it has attracted, favourable or otherwise, is at least a token that the Editors were not mistaken, as partial friends are so apt to be,
in their estimate of the force and originality of [Mr. Froude’s] character, or of the keen, courageous, searching precision, with which he had, though it were but incidentally, put forth his ecclesiastical and theological opinions, and applied them to things as they are.