The Distinctive Principles of the Church of England

http://www.virtueonline.org/portal/modules/news/article.php?storyid=3737

[VirtueOnline] March 12, 2006--Myriads, I am afraid, attend our churches, from year to year, who could not, if their lives depended on it, give an orderly account of the leading doctrines of the Church of England. They have been baptized and confirmed, and perhaps admitted to the Lord's Supper in our pale. They attend our services and use our Prayer Book. They are even zealous for the union of Church and State. But they have never read the Articles or thoroughly investigated the Creeds. Romanists and Dissenters are generally well acquainted with the leading principles of their respective systems. The churchman too often knows nothing of his. To lessen this ignorance, and supply a little light, is one object of this paper.

My other reason is the rise and progress in the land of much unsound teaching under the specious name of "Church principles." That vague, misty, and indefinite phrase seems to turn many people's heads, and attracts adherents who use it without knowing what they mean. There is a kind of fascination about it which appears to rob people of their common sense. They go up and down the world talking incessantly of "sound Church principles" and "true church views" without the slightest clear idea what they mean. Nay, worse than that, if you bring them to book, you find that their favourite expression often covers a whole shoal of weak, foolish, and unscriptural and semi-Romish opinions. To expose the fallacy of these so-called "Church Principles," and to exhibit in contrast the true distinctive principles of the Church of England, is the second object which I have in view in this paper.