Roman Catholics, he said, have a special horror of being called
"schismatic," and that is, of course, a good reason for so calling
them. He would not permit the use of the word "orthodox," because,
like a parson in the pulpit, it is always begging the question. He
refused historical reverence to the Athanasian Creed, and was
delighted when Stanley's review in "The Times" of Mr. Ffoulkes'
learned book showed it to have been written by order of Charles the
Great in 800 A.D. as what Thorold Rogers used to call "an election
squib." In the "Filioque" controversy, once dear to Liddon and to
Gladstone, now, I suppose, obsolete for the English mind, but which
relates to the chief dividing tenet of East from West, he showed an
interest humorous rather than reverent; took pains to acquaint
himself with the views held on it by Dollinger and the old
Catholics; noted with amusement the perplexity of London ladies as
to the meaning of the word when quoted in the much-read "Quarterly"
article, declaring their belief to be that it was a clergyman's
baby born out of wedlock.
Madame Novikoff's political influence, which he recognized to the
full, he treated in the same mocking spirit.
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