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Introduction

John Henry Newman was a Church of England clergyman, one of a group (The Oxford Movement, also called Tractarians) whose members wrote tracts that called the British back to the historical roots of their faith and urging a more serious attitude toward doctrine and church discipline. Like evangelicals, they desired to see a religion of the heart. Among them were John Keble and E.B. Pusey. Some of Newman’s expressions raised concern with Dr. Bagot, bishop of Oxford, who felt people could take them wrong. Newman, who was very sensitive and who set high regard on the word of his bishop, wrote to Pusey, on this day, 21 August, 1838, declaring that he might have to withdraw the tracts. Pusey calmed his fears and said the bishop probably intended nothing of the sort (as indeed proved to be true). Eventually Newman left the Church of England for Roman Catholicism and took many of his friends and followers with him. Aside from his tracts, Newman is famed for his autobiography Apologia Pro Vita Sua and his book The Meaning of the University.