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The Fourfold Sovereignty Of God by Cardinal Henry Edward Manning
This book is a facsimile reprint and may contain imperfections such as marks, notations, marginalia and flawed pages.
144 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1986
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About the author
Henry Edward Manning
420 books14 followersCardinal Henry Edward Manning, cardinal archbishop of Westminster, was born at Hertfordshire, England in 1808. During his early years he befriended Charles and Christopher Wordsworth and attended Harrow School under Doctor Charles Butler. Originally an Anglican deacon, Henry Manning realized the man-made status of the Anglican Church when the Privy Council denied the objective effect of the sacraments. Just two months after being received into Catholicism, he became a priest in 1851 and quickly rose in influence, instituted as an archbishop in 1865. He was a very strong supporter of papal infallibility and went on to promote a modern Catholic view of social justice. He is the author of many books. Cardinal Manning died in 1892.
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Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
August 28, 2024
In this short work, really a collection of a series of speeches he gave in 1870-1871, Cardinal Manning manages to elucidate all the ways (we often forget) that God has sovereignty over Creation and our individual lives. God's sovereignty exists over our intellect, our will, civil society, and man's destiny and future.
"Those advantages of Christianity, historically speaking, have been the elimination of slavery, the sanctification of marriage, the Christian education of youth, the liberation of women and their elevation to a place of honor, the restraining and tempering of warfare, the mitigation of the civil codes (especially regarding the incarceration and punishment of prisoners), the care of the sick and the suffering, the care of orphans, widows, prisoners, outcasts and the poor, and finally, respect of one class for another (not just the lower for the higher, but of the higher for hte lower, and of each one for the others)...the world had never known such things before." (xiii)
"The light of God is the dignity of the intellect of man." (p. 9)
"[W]heresoever the belief in God was low, intellect was low; and that just in proportion as elevation and cultivation of intellect was attained by mankind, in that proportion they approached a purer knowledge of God and of morals." (p. 13)
"The obedience of faith, therefore, which is due to the sovereignty of God, is the most reasonable act of an intellectual being, the most perfect act of which the human intellect in this state of mortality is capable." (p. 15)
"[H]uman reason deprived of light by unbelief is left in darkness." (p. 16)
"It is certain that Deists lose much of the light of the knowledge of God when they reject revelation because even nature ceases to testify as luminously and to speak as articulately of the existence of God, His eternal power and divinity to those in whom the skeptical spirit is at work. Again, if they do not lose the knowledge of their own soul and of its immortality, they begin to doubt about it." (p. 16)
"It is a law of our nature that we can will nothing that we have not first known." (p. 21)
"In proportion as we know God more perfectly our will ought to be more perfectly conformed to the will of God." (p. 21)
"He (Christ) freely chose that way of redemption — the way of blood-shedding, passion, humiliation — because it was a more profuse revelation of perfect love." (p. 30)
"That is to say, the fellowship of the disciples with their Lord, His daily conversation with them, the assimilating power of His life and of His example, transformed them." (p. 43)
"This is 'progress,' this is 'modern civilization,' I acknowledge. Nations may grow cultivated and rich, scientific and prosperous; they may devote all their energies to this world; but they cannot serve God and mammon; and for that reason they serve mammon mightily, and they serve God never." (p. 70)
"It is the State that needs to be established by the Church, not the Church by the State; the inferior cannot sustain the superior." (p. 99)
"Those advantages of Christianity, historically speaking, have been the elimination of slavery, the sanctification of marriage, the Christian education of youth, the liberation of women and their elevation to a place of honor, the restraining and tempering of warfare, the mitigation of the civil codes (especially regarding the incarceration and punishment of prisoners), the care of the sick and the suffering, the care of orphans, widows, prisoners, outcasts and the poor, and finally, respect of one class for another (not just the lower for the higher, but of the higher for hte lower, and of each one for the others)...the world had never known such things before." (xiii)
"The light of God is the dignity of the intellect of man." (p. 9)
"[W]heresoever the belief in God was low, intellect was low; and that just in proportion as elevation and cultivation of intellect was attained by mankind, in that proportion they approached a purer knowledge of God and of morals." (p. 13)
"The obedience of faith, therefore, which is due to the sovereignty of God, is the most reasonable act of an intellectual being, the most perfect act of which the human intellect in this state of mortality is capable." (p. 15)
"[H]uman reason deprived of light by unbelief is left in darkness." (p. 16)
"It is certain that Deists lose much of the light of the knowledge of God when they reject revelation because even nature ceases to testify as luminously and to speak as articulately of the existence of God, His eternal power and divinity to those in whom the skeptical spirit is at work. Again, if they do not lose the knowledge of their own soul and of its immortality, they begin to doubt about it." (p. 16)
"It is a law of our nature that we can will nothing that we have not first known." (p. 21)
"In proportion as we know God more perfectly our will ought to be more perfectly conformed to the will of God." (p. 21)
"He (Christ) freely chose that way of redemption — the way of blood-shedding, passion, humiliation — because it was a more profuse revelation of perfect love." (p. 30)
"That is to say, the fellowship of the disciples with their Lord, His daily conversation with them, the assimilating power of His life and of His example, transformed them." (p. 43)
"This is 'progress,' this is 'modern civilization,' I acknowledge. Nations may grow cultivated and rich, scientific and prosperous; they may devote all their energies to this world; but they cannot serve God and mammon; and for that reason they serve mammon mightily, and they serve God never." (p. 70)
"It is the State that needs to be established by the Church, not the Church by the State; the inferior cannot sustain the superior." (p. 99)
July 3, 2020
87/100 (= 5.1/6) ≈ 5 Stars
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Wow - I don't want to say too much until I've read it again (it's so loaded with solid principles that I feel like I only absorbed a small part of what was said).
But what that I did manage to imbibe was superb. Prophetic, even. Writing almost exactly 150 years ago, this brilliant Catholic mind saw clearly the tendencies of the world and the problems that were starting to come from them, traced them back to the root cause (denial of the soverignty of God in various domains), and predicted what would happen to the world if it continued along that same course.
Bang on. A few quick examples. He said if a society rejects God, there will be a downward spiral, descending towards chaos, with only two possibilities for maintaining order: either a tyrannical dictatorship, or the tyranny of a blind and ruthless mob!
Also, though he saw the beginning of that process 150 years ago, he said first would come the "peace of Liberalism", where everything is accepted, all ideas and religions are placed on the same level, and subjetivity reigns with each to his own. No right or wrong, truth or error -- everything is awesome, just chill out, let's all just get along.
He called that reign of Liberalism the calm before the storm and said that a time would come when "nothing will be persecuted but truth" and if you possess the truth, you will be persecuted for no other reason than that. Sound familiar?
-----------------------------------------
Wow - I don't want to say too much until I've read it again (it's so loaded with solid principles that I feel like I only absorbed a small part of what was said).
But what that I did manage to imbibe was superb. Prophetic, even. Writing almost exactly 150 years ago, this brilliant Catholic mind saw clearly the tendencies of the world and the problems that were starting to come from them, traced them back to the root cause (denial of the soverignty of God in various domains), and predicted what would happen to the world if it continued along that same course.
Bang on. A few quick examples. He said if a society rejects God, there will be a downward spiral, descending towards chaos, with only two possibilities for maintaining order: either a tyrannical dictatorship, or the tyranny of a blind and ruthless mob!
Also, though he saw the beginning of that process 150 years ago, he said first would come the "peace of Liberalism", where everything is accepted, all ideas and religions are placed on the same level, and subjetivity reigns with each to his own. No right or wrong, truth or error -- everything is awesome, just chill out, let's all just get along.
He called that reign of Liberalism the calm before the storm and said that a time would come when "nothing will be persecuted but truth" and if you possess the truth, you will be persecuted for no other reason than that. Sound familiar?
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews