THE NOTE OF ORTHODOXY 23

life throughout the whole vast solidarity.

1
The effect
of the repudiation of the Bible in Cromwellian England
would probably have been no greater.
In drawing attention to these considerations, it is
certainly not my purpose to advocate the Faith of the
Ninth Century as the basis of Reunion against that of
the Fifth. Nor is it in my mind, whatever my own
doctrinal standpoint may be, to criticise the adoption
of the Creed of Chalcedon as the dogmatic basis on
which the Anglican Churches should unite with those
to whom it would be a maximum. Broadly speaking, it
is the basis on which the varied schools of
thought
among us are agreed to remain united and on which,
if their conflicts are not
appeased, at least they are
finding an increased will to unity.
After all there is truth in the homely Manx proverb :
"
My skin is nearer to me than my shirt." It would
be a dearly-bought approximation to the Eastern-
Orthodox position that was purchased by an Anglican
schism or by the slamming of the door on Home
Reunion.
Nor is it in my scope to examine whether it is desirable
that the Eastern-Orthodox should shift their ground
or whether on their own principles that ground is firm.
My object is to stress the facts that the Orthodox
world rests upon Orthodox Theology, and that, if I

may use the metaphor (for Orthodoxy is not a dry

doctrinal bundle but a living whole), the medullary
cord of that Theology is the Faith of the Undivided
Church of the (Ecumenical Councils.
To persuade a Baptist to agree to treat the Baptism
of Infants or an Independent to treat Episcopacy as
matters of secondary importance may conceivably be
easier than squaring a circle. The asking the Eastern-
1 The
Orthodox Communion it reckoned at 140 million! of ouli. There ire veiy
few Papaliits (Uniates or otheri), and, except in Ruitia, practically no diuenten, in
tht Orthodox nation*.
24 PRELIMINARY TO INTERCOMMUNION
Orthodox to-day to recede from Nicaea II to Chalcedon
would be no less egregious than to propose Union to
the Jews on the basis of the Messiahship of Jesus or to
the Papalist on that of the autocephalicity of local
Churches.
Not, of course, that any Eastern-Orthodox would
admit any difference between the Faith of the Fifth
Century (or for that matter of the First Century) and
the Faith of the Ninth Century.
His case is neither more nor less than that the Faith
as he holds it is the Faith of the earliest ages. For him
the vital necessity of Episcopacy to the existence of
the Church, the sacerdotal powers and office of the
Priesthood, the Real Presence, the propitiatory character
of the Eucharistic Sacrifice, the Invocation of Saints,
the Seven Sacraments, the supremacy of the (Ecumenical
Councils as infallible 1 organs of the Christian Society
and so forth, are as much fundamental to the Faith of
Chalcedon as the dogmatic statements of the Creed of
which that Council made the affirmation the duty of
every Christian.
" You "
cannot," the Eastern-Orthodox tells us, pick
and choose what you will believe. The Church is the
organism of Faith and Love. The (Ecumenical Faith
is its
great unifying tradition, a deposit committed to
the saints once and for all by Christ Himself and safe-
guarded by the infallible working of the Holy Spirit
in the whole body of the Church. It is to be accepted
not because of its logical warranty but because not to
hold it in its entirety is to break the unity of the Christian
Brotherhood."
If you reply nego major em, he will tell you kindly and

firmly that you and he are both the poles asunder and
that while it is always good to exchange views charitably,
care must be taken by both of you to avoid a logomachy.

*
On the Orthodox term* for Infallible and their content. ee below, p. Si.
 THE BOSOM OF ORTHODOXY 25

The position of one or the other must be charged

fundamentally before an approximation between you
and him is
possible.
On the other hand, if he find you, as the Eastern-
1
Orthodox say, "near to the bosom of Orthodoxy,"
that to say with an inclination to accept its funda-
is

mental, i.e., the Faith of the first nine centuries, or even

sympathetic to its genius, you will be surprised at his
2
easinesson the very matters on which popular miscon-
ception might have led you to expect him to be
stiff.

That misconception is in the first instance due to the

skillwith which from the beginning Papalist writers
have obscured the main issue by presenting the Filioque
and similar banners of controversy as per se the cause of
the Great Schism, whereas the objection to them is
independent of their theological "or other correctitude
and is that they are " innovations 3 on the (Ecumenical
order of the first nine centuries. 4 It is continued,
however, through the extraordinary and altogether
vicious delusion by which most Anglicans appear to be
possessed, viz that the right way to obtain a summary
:

of Orthodox Theology is to deduce it from the Fathers

of the first five centuries and not to read one or other
of the many able, exhaustive and mutually consistent,
treatises of Eastern-Orthodox theologians of to-day.
Someexcuse may be found for this amazing super-
stition on the part of the ordinary Anglican. 5
But there is none for an expert in patristics, however
great his knowledge and authority, to proceed to formu-
late conclusions upon the beliefs of the Orthodox or

1
Androutsos, p. 5. eij TOI)S (C(5\Tovj rfjs
0/>0o5ofas.
1
That this easiness is not an inconsistency will be evident from a perusal of chapter ii .

*
Ka.tvorofj.lai.
4
Answer of the Great Church of Constantinople, p. 53, et passim.
*
The only comprehensive survey of the Eastern-Orthodox Churches in English with
which I am acquainted is a book by the Papalist, Dr. Fortescue, which, apart from itt
mordant hostility to Orthodoxy and from its propagandist objective, distortt and
obscures alike its history and principle*.