Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 36.djvu/69

Manning consumption. The marriage, though childless, had been extremely happy, and Manning felt his wife's loss acutely, and to the end of his days religiously observed the anniversary of her death.

At his ordination Manning already believed in baptismal regeneration. In 1834 he adopted Hooker's doctrine of the eucharist, and about the same time he assimilated the doctrine of apostolical succession, and learned to attach a high value to tradition (cf. his first published sermon, The English Church; its Succession and Witness, London, 1836, and another, The Rule of Faith, London, 1838, 8vo). How far this rapid development was spontaneous, how far due to the influence of 'Tracts for the Times,' cannot be precisely determined. He was not at the time closely associated with any of the leaders of the tractarian movement, and he never contributed to the tracts. Whatever savoured of Erastianism was now utterly abhorrent to him. In the ecclesiastical commission of 1835 he discerned 'a virtual extinction of the polity of the church' (The Principle of the Ecclesiastical Commission examined, in a Letter to the Right Rev. Lord Bishop of Chichester, London, 1838, 8vo). He was feeling his way towards a scheme for a thorough system of national but clerically controlled education, and took an active part in the establishment of diocesan boards in connection with the National Society for Promoting the Education of the Poor. On 30 Dec. 1840 he was instituted to the archdeaconry of Chichester, and in his first 'charge' deplored the paralysis of convocation. In 1842 he was appointed select preacher at Oxford, and published, under the title 'The Unity of the Church,' London, 1842, 8vo, 2nd edit. 1845, an able exposition of Anglo-catholic principles, intended to serve as a complement, and, to some extent, as a corrective of Mr. Gladstone's essay on 'The State in its Relations with the Church.' He had still, however, no sympathy with Rome, and after arguing elaborately for visible organic unity as a note of the true church, devoted a footnote (pp. 152-4) and a few pages in the last chapter to the discussion of the Roman claim to primacy. 'Tract XC he thought casuistical, and deeply grieved Newman by preaching a strongly anti-papal sermon in St. Marys, Oxford, on Guy Fawkes' day 1843. Like Newman, he could fill St. Mary's on a week-day. His 'Sermons preached before the University of Oxford,' published in 1844 (Oxford, 8vo), are characterised by deep spirituality and occasional eloquence.

With [q. v.] Manning had no personal acquaintance until Ward's degradation by the Oxford convocation, 13 Feb. 1845; against this step he recorded his vote, having come to Oxford in the worst of weather for the express purpose. After the sentence he met Ward in Dr. Pusey's rooms. A long conversation followed on Lutheranism, and Ward, defending the strongly anti-Lutheran position taken up in his book on 'The Ideal of a Christian Church,' drew from Manning the remark that that was the most Lutheran book he had ever read. The reference, of course, was to the extreme vehemence of its denunciatory passages. The connection thus formed ripened into a close friendship which lasted throughout Ward's life, though Manning was at first extremely pained by Ward's marriage.

After the secession of Ward and Newman, Manning became for a time one of the most trusted leaders of the high church party; nor was his confidence in the tenability of its position seriously shaken until he proved the difficulty of making it intelligible to foreigners during a tour on the continent, July 1847 to June 1848. He travelled slowly through Belgium and Germany to Italy, was much impressed by the apparent vitality of Romanism, and in May 1848 had an audience of Pope Pius IX, who praised the philanthropic spirit of English Christianity. On his return to England he found the church in a turmoil about the recent elevation of [q. v.] to the episcopal bench. The education question had also entered on a new phase, in consequence of the determination of government to make grants in aid of new elementary schools conditional upon the insertion in their trust deeds of certain clauses providing for their management by local committees. These clauses were regarded by the clergy with much suspicion, and at a meeting of the National Society for Promoting the Education of the Poor, held in Westminster on 6 June 1849, the Rev. G. A. (now Archdeacon) Denison moved a resolution adverse to the acceptance of state aid on such terms, but afterwards withdrew it in favour of an amendment by Manning to much the same effect, but couched in more diplomatic language. A compromise was eventually arrived at. On 8 March 1850 judgment was given by the privy council in the case of [q. v.], who had been refused institution to a living on account of his unorthodox views on baptism, and twelve days later Manning's name appeared in the 'Times' at the head of the subscribers to a protest against the decision. On the defeat of the attempt subsequently made to settle the question by legis-