Pusey, EDWARD BOUVERIE, was born in the year 1800 at Pusey in Berkshire. He was descended from a family of Flemish refugees; his father was the youngest son of the first Viscount Folkestone, and had assumed the name of Pusey when the estates in Berkshire were bequeathed to him by the last representatives of the Pusey family. He was educated at Eton and Christ Church, Oxford, and was elected a Fellow of Oriel College in 1823. As soon as he had completed his studies at Oxford he passed to Germany, partly to study German, which was in the Oxford of those days practically an unknown tongue, partly to study oriental languages, and partly to become acquainted with the latest forms of German theological teaching. In 1827 he returned to England, and in the following year the Duke of Wellington appointed him regius professor of Hebrew at Oxford, a position which he retained until his death. Although his fame in other respects has caused his Hebrew lecturing to be forgotten, he laboured most unweariedly in the duties of his chair, and attracted a great number of pupils. His first work was an essay in which he sketched the causes that contributed to the Rationalistic character of recent German theology. He acknowledges his indebtedness to Professor Tholuck for some portions of this essay, but the elaborate proof of his position was his own work executed with characteristic thoroughness. It was severely commented on as leaning very decidedly in the direction of the Rationalistic teaching with which it dealt: the charge was greatly exaggerated, besides being caused in part by vagueness of expression throughout the volume. His main position was unassailable: German Rationalism he maintained was the consequence of the spiritual deadness of the orthodox Lutheranism of the day. He was misunderstood as if he had attacked the creed of the Lutherans in its orthodox portions: as a matter of fact he only wished to attribute Rationalism to the want of life in the Lutheran body. But many of his statements were in later years very unsatisfactory to himself, and he withdrew the work from circulation. The whole aim of his life was to prevent the spread in England of Rationalism such as that with which he had become familiar in Germany. Hence, when in 1833 John Henry Newman with the same object began the issue of the Tracts for the Times, Pusey very soon joined him; and they, with Keble, were the leaders of this eventful effort. Their object was not to attack the statements of Rationalistic teachers; there was as yet no call for that in England; but they desired to stir up in the Church of England a spiritual vitality and power which would be of itself the best preservative against the infection of the Rationalistic spirit. For this purpose they attempted not to reform, but to restore; they appealed to the idea of the church, to its divine institution, to its services, to its sacraments, to its formulas of faith, to its history, and to the examples of the holiest lives in former generations. They endeavoured to make the church live again before the eyes and minds of men as it had lived in times past. In this connection Pusey wrote his contributions to the Tracts for the Times, especially those on Baptism and the Holy Eucharist. His sermons also were vigorous appeals to live the Christian life, and careful expositions of the doctrines which the church from the first had taught. With a similar purpose also in 1836 he commenced the translation of the writings of the ancient fathers of the Christian church under the title of the Oxford Library of the Fathers. Dr Pusey's chief contributions to it were a translation of St Augustine's Confessions and of several of the works of Tertullian. The result of these efforts—to which, with the exception of his professorial duties, Dr Pusey entirely devoted himself—was most conspicuous, and extended far beyond the ranks of those who were called by their opponents either Newmanites or Puseyites. But the work was checked by the action of the authorities at Oxford. First Newman's celebrated Tract 90 was condemned in 1841, and in 1843 Pusey was suspended for three years from his office of preaching in Oxford. The occasion of this suspension was a sermon on the Holy Eucharist which he preached before the University, and which a board of six doctors of divinity, without allowing Pusey a hearing, or specifying the points on which he was supposed to be in the wrong, pronounced to be contrary to the teaching of the Church of England. As soon as an opportunity offered Pusey reiterated his teaching, and this time he was unmolested. But before his suspension was over Newman had joined the Roman Catholic communion, and with him went several of his leading disciples. All rumours pointed to the certainty of Pusey soon following; but those who knew him best were assured that never for one moment did he entertain any thought of leaving the Church of England. With Keble he at once set himself to reassure those who were reeling under the blow of Newman's departure; and it was mainly the moral weight of Pusey's work and character which prevented the powerful efforts of Newman between 1833 and 1841 from resulting in a catastrophe greater than any which the English Church has ever experienced. Pusey's unfailing loyalty to the church and deep conviction of God's presence with it, his buoyant hopefulness even in the darkest days, and his great patience cheered and settled many anxious hearts, and stopped others who were on the point of following Newman. His attitude would have had a yet wider result, except for the sad events which followed in rapid succession in the ten years subsequent to Newman's secession. The new power which a civil court had acquired over doctrinal suits—which was exhibited in the judgment in the Gorham case—the constant attacks of bishops and others upon the Oxford movement, the practical inhibition of Pusey from all ministerial work in the diocese of Oxford by Bishop Wilberforce, whereby it was made to appear that the church disowned his teaching—these and other less important but significant events caused the departure to the Roman Church of another band of distinguished men, including Archdeacon (Cardinal) Manning and Archdeacon Wilberforce. But still Pusey laboured on, carefully defining the exact position of the English Church, as against Roman claims on the one hand and against Zwinglianism and Erastianism on the other.
Only the chief of his numerous writings during this period can be alluded to. They included a lengthy letter on the practice of confession, The Church of England leaves her children free to whom to open their griefs (1850), a treatise the form of which makes it appear to belong to a moment of controversy, although the matter is really of permanent value; a general defence of his own position in A Letter to the Bishop of London in 1851; a work on The Royal Supremacy not an arbitrary authority, but limited by the laws of the Church of which Kings are members, in 1850; a larger book on The Doctrine of the Real Presence, as contained in the Fathers (1855), and as taught in the Church of England (1857). In this class of writings may be included also Dr Pusey's Eirenicon (part i. in 1865, ii. in 1869, iii. in 1870). The object of these volumes was to clear the way for reunion between the Church of England and the Church of Rome on the basis of Catholic, as distinct from Roman Catholic, doctrine and practice.
The reform of Oxford University, which was undertaken after the report of the first Royal Commission on the Universities, and which destroyed for ever the integrity of the originally most intimate bond between the University and the Church, greatly occupied Pusey's mind. His evidence before the commission, his remarkable pamphlet on the comparative advantages of Collegiate and Professorial Teaching and Discipline, and his assiduous work on the Hebdomadal Council for many years are proofs of the interest that he took in the welfare of his university, and of the importance that he attached to a close connection between education and religion.
From 1860 onwards the tide had turned. The teaching for which the Tractarians had laboured and suffered was at that time beginning to be recognised, and those disciples of the Oxford movement who had survived the shock of the events of the last twenty years were spreading its principles throughout the country. But the fruits of the intolerance and persecution of which Oxford had been the scene were also ripening in the form of the spread of religious indifference, based on Rationalistic views of revelation. This was the enemy which from the first Pusey had dreaded. He had at least the satisfaction of knowing that, as a result of the movement in which he had taken so prominent a part, the inner life of the English Church was far better able to bear the onset of such a foe, and to estimate the moral and spiritual ravages which it would make, than was the Lutheran body of the 18th century, or even the Church of England in 1830. Against such teaching he contended for the rest of his life. All his later sermons before the university and most of his later books deal with it. It was with this purpose that he prosecuted Professor Jowett for his statements in his commentary on St Paul's Epistles, and that he took so prominent a part in the later controversy about the Athanasian Creed. His chief works in this connection are the Lectures on the Book of Daniel, and What is of Faith as to Everlasting Punishment? The former, delivered in 1863, vigorously attack those writers who would assign to the Book of Daniel a date as late as the 2d century B.C. Apart from the marks which the lectures bear of the heated controversy of the time when they were delivered, they are a monument of the author's intellectual power, wide reading, and solid learning. The other book is against the denial of everlasting punishment: its sobriety and fullness, the familiarity which it shows with all the issues raised in the controversy, its deep religious feeling, its calm and calming tone make it one of the most remarkable of Pusey's works. Of a kindred character, although in a different field, are the last two university sermons which he wrote—on the relation of science to faith and on the nature of prophecy.
Two other works must be noticed. Pusey inherited from his predecessor in the Hebrew chair the task of completing A Catalogue of the Arabic Manuscripts in the Bodleian Library (1835). It was a most toilsome duty, and occupied his time for six years. Pusey's Commentary on the Minor Prophets (1860-77) was his contribution to a commentary on the whole Bible which he had in his mind for many years, and on which he enlisted the labours of Keble and many others. Pusey alone completed his task; death, advancing years, or the claims of other duties prevented the others from contributing their share.
In private life Pusey was a man of warm affection, and widely known for his gentleness, sincerity, and humility. He rarely went into society in early life; at first he withdrew from it for purposes of study and to save more money to give to the poor, but from the time of his wife's death in 1839 he avoided all social amusements. But he was always accessible to any one who wished his advice on religious questions; in fact, he was constantly sought as a spiritual guide by persons of every station. His charity was bounded only by his income; besides abundant gifts to poor people, he spent large sums of money in helping to provide churches in East London, in building St Saviour's, Leeds, and in founding and supporting sisterhoods. His capacity for study and for literary work was immense. He worked only at what it was his duty to study, but within that line he spared neither time nor pains in thoroughly mastering every detail. His power of keeping his main object before his mind without being confused by its details, and of grouping the details in their due position, can be seen in almost any of his works. Opponents of all schools gave him the credit of being confused; but an occasional confusion in his manner of expressing his thoughts did not prevent him from knowing his own mind with singular clearness. He died on 16th September 1882.
The Life of Pusey by Canon Liddon, left unfinished at his death, was completed by the present writer and the Rev. R. J. Wilson, the Canon's literary executors (5 vols. 1893-99).