Untitled - Rore Sanctifica

254 Corporate Re-union.
arrangements. Viewed in its structure it has
never been more than partially Catholic. If
its ritual has been mainly such, its yet Articles
are the historical
offspring
of Luther and Calvin.
And its Ecclesiastical organization has ever
been, in its fundamental principle, Erastian.
To make that actual, visible, tangible body
Catholic, would be simply to make a new creation.
It would be to turn a Panther into a Hind : there
are great similarities between a Panther and a
Hind : still they are possessed of separate
natures, and a change from one to the other
would be a destruction and reproduction, not a
process. It could be done perhaps without a
miracle in a succession of ages, but in any
assignable period, no.
See, such an objector would continue, what
would be needed to bring the Anglican Church
into a condition capable of Union with the
Catholic body. There have ever been three
great parties in it. The Rod of Aaron (so to
call it) must swallow up the serpents of the
Magicians. That Rod has grown of late years :
doubtless. But the history of opinion, and of
Anglican opinion,
has ever been a course of
reactions. Look at ourselves even, as an
illustration of this ; Truths de Fide are un
changeable and indefectible : but when you
come to the opinions of the schools, to the
questions still open to Theological controversy