Untitled - Rore Sanctifica

208 Spirit irmohich Re-union should be sought.
position as it had stood for several previous
centuries. The repudiation of the Supremacy
of the Roman Pontiff need not have altered
that theory in any greater degree than the
Eastern theory of Unity was altered when East
and West became formally separated. But
later on, when the English Church had to adapt
herself by slow degrees to the changed relations
which existed between certain portions of the
English population and herself, irregularities
and incongruities, like unhealthy parasites, began
to attach themselves to her system. And when,
after the sterility of two dreary centuries, during
which it had been found impossible for those
whose ancestors had renounced obedience to the
Patriarch of the West, to preach with anything
like consistency, obedience to themselves and
their spiritual rulers, the old theory was applied,
it signally and completely failed. The new
principle of ecclesiastical independence that had
been introduced in the
reign of Henry the
Eighth notoriously ran to seed during the latter
years of the life of King Charles the First to
the loss both of Church and Crown. And so,
by degrees, in due course, the ancient theory of
Unity retained even up to the period of the
Repeal of the Test and Corporation Acts, lost
its influence and power. This was all the more
manifest when, first feebly but afterwards more
vigorously, the missionary idea was set in motion,