Nicholas Patrick Stephen Wiseman | |
|---|---|
| Cardinal,Archbishop of Westminster | |
 Photograph by Herbert Watkins,c. 1860s | |
| Province | Westminster |
| Diocese | Westminster |
| Appointed | 29 August 1847 (Coadjutor Vicar Apostolic) |
| Installed | 29 September 1850 |
| Term ended | 15 February 1865 |
| Predecessor | Thomas Walsh(as Vicar Apostolic) |
| Successor | Henry Edward Manning |
| Other post | Cardinal-Priest of Santa Pudenziana |
| Previous posts |
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| Orders | |
| Ordination | 19 March 1825 |
| Consecration | 8 June 1840 by Giacomo Filippo Fransoni |
| Created cardinal | 30 September 1850 byPius IX |
| Rank | Cardinal-Priest |
| Personal details | |
| Born | Nicolás Patricio Esteban Wiseman[1] (1802-08-03)3 August 1802[2] |
| Died | 15 February 1865(1865-02-15) (aged 62) York Place,Portman Square, London, England |
| Buried | Westminster Cathedral |
| Denomination | Catholic |
| Parents | James Wiseman and Xaviera Wiseman (née Strange) |
| Coat of arms |  |
| Styles of Nicholas Wiseman | |
|---|---|
.svg) | |
| Reference style | His Eminence |
| Spoken style | Your Eminence |
| Informal style | Cardinal |
Nicholas Patrick Stephen Wiseman[3] (3 August 1802 – 15 February 1865) was anEnglish Roman Catholic prelate who served as the firstArchbishop of Westminster upon there-establishment of the Roman Catholic hierarchy inEngland and Wales in 1850.[4] He was made acardinal in 1850.
Born in Seville to Irish parents, Wiseman was educated at a school in Waterford before attending St. Cuthbert's College atUshaw. From there he went to theEnglish College in Rome, where he subsequently became Rector. While in Rome, he was assigned to preach to the English Catholics there. As Rector, he was the representative of the English bishops. During a visit to England in 1836, he helped initiate the periodicalDublin Review. In 1840, he was appointed president ofOscott College.
Wiseman was born inSeville on 2 February 1802, the younger son of merchant James Wiseman and his second wife, Xaviera (née Strange), ofWaterford, Ireland, who had settled in Spain for business.[5][6] On his father's death in 1805, he was brought to his parents' home inWaterford. In 1810, he was sent toUshaw College, nearDurham, where he was educated until the age of sixteen.[7] Wiseman would later recall thatJohn Lingard, Vice-President of the college at the time, showed the quiet, retiring boy much kindness. In 1818, Wiseman proceeded to theEnglish College in Rome, which had reopened in 1818 after being closed by theNapoleonic Wars for twenty years. He graduated with adoctorate of theology with distinction in July 1824, and wasordained to the priesthood 10 March 1825.[2]
He was appointedvice-rector of the English College in 1827, andrector in 1828, although he was not yet twenty-six years of age. He had this office until 1840. From the first a devoted student and scholar of antiquity, he devoted much time to the examination ofOriental manuscripts in theVatican library, and a first volume, entitledHorae Syriacae, published in 1827, showed that he had promise as a good scholar.[6][7]
Pope Leo XII (r. 1823–1829) appointed himcurator of theArabic manuscripts in the Vatican, and professor ofOriental languages in the Roman University. His academic life was, however, interrupted by the pope's command to preach to English residents of Rome. A course of his lectures,On the Connexion between Science and Revealed Religion, attracted much attention. His general thesis was that whereas scientific teaching had repeatedly been thought to disprove Christian doctrine, further investigation has shown that reconciliation is possible.[7] It is much to Wiseman's credit that his lectures on therelationship between religion and science were approved by a critic as stern asAndrew Dickson White. In his extremely influentialA History of the Warfare of Science with Theology in Christendom, the primary contention of which was theconflict thesis, White wrote that "it is a duty and a pleasure to state here that one great Christian scholar did honour to religion and to himself by quietly accepting the claims of science and making the best of them.... That man was Nicholas Wiseman, better known afterward as Cardinal Wiseman. The conduct of this pillar of the Church contrasts admirably with that of timid Protestants, who were filling England with shrieks and denunciations".[8]
Wiseman visited England during 1835–1836 and delivered lectures on the principles and main doctrines of Catholicism in theSardinian Chapel,Lincoln's Inn Fields, and in the church inMoorfields.[9] The effect of his lectures was considerable. AtEdward Bouverie Pusey's request,John Henry Newman reviewed them in the periodicalBritish Critic during December 1836, treating them for the most part with sympathy as a triumph over popular Protestantism. To another critic, who had claimed a resemblance between Catholic and pagan ceremonies, Wiseman replied admitting the likeness, and saying that it could be shown equally well to exist between Christian and non-Christian doctrines.[7]
In 1836, Wiseman initiated the periodicalDublin Review, partly to give English Catholics greater ideals for their religion and enthusiasm for the papacy, and partly to deal with theOxford Movement. In 1916 the name was changed to theWiseman Review.[10] At this date he was already distinguished as a scholar and critic, fluent in many languages, and informed on questions of scientific, artistic or historical interest.[7]
An article by Wiseman on theDonatistschism, appearing in theDublin Review in July 1839, made an impression inOxford, Newman and others seeing the analogy between Donatists and Anglicans. Wiseman, preaching at the opening ofSt Mary's Church, Derby, in the same year, anticipated Newman's argument onreligious development, published six years later. In 1840, he was consecrated bishop, and was sent to England as coadjutor to BishopThomas Walsh, vicar-apostolic of the Central district, and was also appointed president ofOscott College near Birmingham.[7]
Oscott, during his presidency, became a centre for English Catholics. The Oxford converts (1845 and later) added to Wiseman's responsibilities, as many of them found themselves wholly without means, while the old Catholic body looked on the newcomers with distrust. It was by his advice that Newman and his companions spent some time in Rome before undertaking clerical work in England. Soon after the accession ofPope Pius IX, Bishop Walsh was assigned to be vicar-apostolic of the London district with Wiseman still as his coadjutor. For Wiseman, the appointment became permanent on Walsh's death in February 1849.[7]
On his arrival from Rome in 1847, Wiseman acted as an informal diplomatic envoy from the pope, to ascertain from the government what assistance England was likely to give in implementing the liberal policy with which Pius inaugurated his reign. In response, Lord Minto was sent to Rome as "an authentic organ of the British Government", but the policy in question proved abortive. Residing in London inGolden Square, Wiseman threw himself into his new duties with many-sided activities, working especially for the reclamation of Catholic criminals and for the restoration of the lapsed poor to the practice of their religion. He was zealous for the establishment of religious communities, both of men and women, and for performing retreats and missions. He preached on 4 July 1848 at the opening ofSt George's, Southwark, an occasion unique in England since theReformation, 14 bishops and 240 priests being present, and six religious orders of men being represented.[7]
Wiseman found himself opposed by some of his clergy who disliked hisultramontane ideas of his "Romanizing and innovating zeal", especially in revivals of ritual. In July 1850, Wiseman heard of the pope's intention to create him acardinal. Arriving at Rome, he found that the Pope wanted him to return to England as Cardinal and Archbishop of Westminster. The papal briefUniversalis Ecclesiae was dated 29 September 1850, and Wiseman wrote a pastoral from Rome on 7 October, in which he said "Catholic England has been restored to its orbit in the ecclesiastical firmament, from which its light had long vanished".[7][note 1]
Wiseman travelled slowly to England, viaVienna. When he reached London on 11 November, the whole country was ablaze with indignation at the "papal aggression," which was interpreted to imply a new and unjustifiable claim to territorial rule.[11] Some indeed feared that his life was endangered by the violence of popular feeling. Wiseman displayed calmness and courage, and immediately penned a pamphlet of over 30 pages titledAppeal to the English People, in which he explained the nature of the pope's action. He argued that the admitted principle of toleration included leave to establish a diocesan hierarchy. In his concluding paragraphs, he effectively contrasted that dominion over Westminster, which he was taunted with claiming, with his duties towards the poor Catholics resident there, with which alone he was really concerned. A course of lectures at St George's,Southwark, further moderated the storm. In July 1852, he presided atSt Mary's College, Oscott over the first provincialsynod of Westminster, at which Newman preached his sermon on the "Second Spring"; and at this date, Wiseman's dream of the rapid conversion of England to the ancient faith seemed capable of realisation. But many difficulties with his own people shortly beset his path, due largely to the suspicions aroused by his evident preference for the ardent Roman zeal of the converts, and especially of Manning, to the dull and cautious formalism of the old Catholics.[7]
During the autumn of 1853, Wiseman went to Rome, where Pius IX gave full approval to his ecclesiastical policy. It was during this visit to Rome that Wiseman projected, and began to write, the most popular book that he ever wrote, the historical romance,Fabiola, a tale of the Church of the Catacombs. The book was published at the end of 1854, and its success was immediate and phenomenal. Translations of it were published in almost every European language.[6] Wiseman wroteFabiola in part as an answer to the vigorouslyanti-Catholic bookHypatia (1853) byCharles Kingsley.[12][13] The novel was mainly intended the aid the embattled Catholicminority in England.
The year 1854 was also marked by Wiseman's presence in Rome at the definition of thedogma of theImmaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin on 8 December.[7]
In 1855, Wiseman applied for acoadjutor bishop.George Errington, who was thenBishop of Plymouth and his friend since boyhood, was appointed Coadjutor Archbishop of Westminster andTitular Archbishop of Trapezus. Two years later, Manning was appointed Provost of Westminster. During Wiseman's later years Errington was hostile to Manning, and to himself insofar as he was supposed to be influenced by Manning. The story of the estrangement, which was largely a matter of temperament, is told in Ward's biography. In July 1860 Errington was deprived by the Pope of his coadjutorship with right of succession. He retired toPrior Park, near Bath, where he died in 1886.[14]
Wiseman's speeches, sermons and lectures, delivered during his tour, were printed in a volume of 400 pages, showing an extraordinary power of speaking with sympathy and tact. He was able to use considerable influence with English politicians, partly because in his time English Catholics were wavering in their historical allegiance to theLiberal party. He was in a position to secure concessions that bettered the condition of Catholics in regard to poor schools, reformatories and workhouses, and in the status of their army chaplains. In 1863, addressing theCatholic Congress in Mechelen, he stated that since 1830 the number of priests in England had increased from 434 to 1242, and of convents of women from 16 to 162, while there were no religious houses of men in 1830 and 55 in 1863. The last two years of his life were troubled by illness and by controversies in which he found himself, by Manning's influence, compelled to adopt a policy less liberal than that which had been his during earlier years.[14]
Wiseman had to condemn the Association for the Promotion of the Unity of Christendom, with which he had shown some sympathy at its inception during 1857, and to forbid Catholic parents to send their sons toOxford or Cambridge, though at an earlier date he had hoped (with Newman) that at Oxford at least a college or hall might be assigned to them. In other respects, however, his last years were cheered by marks of general regard and admiration, in which non-Catholics joined. After his death on 16 February 1865, there was an extraordinary demonstration of popular respect as his body was taken from St Mary's, Moorfields, toSt Mary's Catholic Cemetery in Kensal Green, where it was intended that it should rest only until a more appropriate place could be found in a Catholic cathedral church of Westminster. On 30 January 1907, the body was removed with great ceremony from Kensal Green and was reburied in the crypt of thenew cathedral, where it lies beneath a Gothic altar tomb, with a recumbent effigy of the archbishop in full pontificals.[14]
Wiseman's birthplace on Calle Fabiola in Barrio Santa Cruz, the old Jewish part ofSeville, features a commemorative plaque, as does Etloe House in Leyton, London E10, where he lived from 1858 to 1864.
"The doctrine and practice of the Church must not be allowed to be impugned by those who have no claim at all to Scripture, and who can prove neither the canon, its inspiration, nor its primary doctrines, except through that very authority which they are questioning, and through treacherous inconsistency with the principles on which they are interrogating it. When many years ago this ground was boldly adopted, it was charged with being an attempt to throw Protestants into infidelity, and sap the foundations of the Bible. Years of experience, and observation not superficial, have only strengthened our conviction, that this course must be fearlessly pursued. We must deny to Protestantism any right to use the Bible, much more to interpret it. Cruel and unfeeling it may be pronounced by those who understand the strength of our position, and the cogency of the argument, but it is much more charitable than to leave them to the repeated sin of blaspheming God's Spouse and trying to undermine the faith of our poor Catholics. The cry of 'The Bible! [T]he Bible! [N]othing but the Bible!' is as perilous to man's salvation as the Jews' senseless cry, 'The Temple of the Lord! [T]he Temple of the Lord! [T]he Temple of the Lord it is!' (Jeremiah 7:4)"[15]
Wiseman was sculpted byChristopher Moore during 1853.[16]
InRobert Browning's 1855 poem "Bishop Blougram's Apology", the speaker, a somewhat hypocritical English Catholic cleric, is based on Wiseman.
Several schools have been named after Wiseman, including:
This article incorporates text from a publication now in thepublic domain: Hutton, Arthur Wollaston (1911). "Wiseman, Nicholas Patrick Stephen". InChisholm, Hugh (ed.).Encyclopædia Britannica. Vol. 28 (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. pp. 752–753.
| Catholic Church titles | ||
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| Preceded by | Vicar Apostolic of the London District 1849–1850 | Last appointment |
| New title | Archbishop of Westminster 1850–1865 | Succeeded by |
| Preceded by | Cardinal priestofSanta Pudenziana 1850–1865 | Succeeded by |
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