By What Authority?

by Robert Hugh Benson

He did not follow the argument closely, since it seemed to him but a secondary question now; though he heard one or two sentences. At one point Campion was explaining what the Church meant by substance. It was that which transcended the senses.

“Are you not Dr. Fulke?” he said. “And yet I see nothing but your colour and exterior form. The substance of Dr. Fulke cannot be seen.”

“I will not vouchsafe to reply upon this answer,” snarled Fulke, whose temper had not been improved by the debate—“too childish for a sophister!”

Then followed interminable syllogisms, of which Campion would not accept the premises; and no real progress was made. The Jesuit tried to explain the doctrine that the wicked may be said not to eat the Body in the Sacrament, because they receive not the virtue of It, though they receive the Thing; but Fulke would not hear him. The distinction was new to Anthony, with his puritan training, and he sat pondering it while the debate passed on.

The afternoon discussion, too, was to little purpose. More and more Anthony, and others with him, began to see that the heart of the matter was the authority of the Church; and that unless that was settled, all other debate was beside the point; and the importance of this was brought out for him more clearly than ever on the 27th of the month, when the fourth and last debate took place, and on the subject of the sufficiency of the Scriptures unto salvation.

Mr. Charke, who had now succeeded as disputant, began with extempore prayer, in which as usual the priest refused to join, praying and crossing himself apart.

Mr. Walker then opened the disputation with a pompous and insolent speech about “one Campion,” an “unnatural man to his country, degenerated from an Englishman, an apostate in religion, a fugitive from this realm, unloyal to his prince.” Campion sat with his eyes cast down, until the minister had done.

Then the discussion began. The priest pointed out that Protestants were not even decided as to what were Scriptures and what were not, since Luther rejected three epistles in the New Testament; therefore, he argued, the Church is necessary as a guide, first of all, to tell men what is Scripture. Walker evaded by saying he was not a Lutheran but a Christian; and then the talk turned on to apocryphal books. But it was not possible to evade long, and the Jesuit soon touched his opponent.

“To leave a door to traditions,” he said, “which the Holy Ghost may deliver to the true Church, is both manifest and seen: as in the Baptism of infants, the Holy Ghost proceeding from Father to Son, and such other things mentioned, which are delivered by tradition. Prove these directly by the Scripture if you can!”

Charke answered by the analogy of circumcision which infants received, and by quoting Christ’s words as to “sending” of the Comforter; and they were soon deep in detailed argument; but once more Anthony saw that it was all a question of the interpretation of Scripture; and, therefore, that it would seem that an authoritative interpreter was necessary—and where could such be found save in an infallible living Voice? And once more a question of Campion’s drove the point home.