For example, Curran's published speeches give the general reader a very

sufficient specimen of the richness of his language, the fertility of

imagination, and even the subtlety of his humour. Grattan's speeches,

most of them mere fragments, and probably few published with his

revision, give the full impression of his boldness of thought, depth

of argument, and exquisite pungency of expression. Burke's printed

speeches are even said to give a higher sense of his wonderful ability

than when they were delivered in the House of Commons. There is an

anecdote that, when Pitt had read one of those earlier speeches in the

form of a pamphlet, he expressed his astonishment. "Is it possible,"

he exclaimed, "that this fine oration _can be_ what we heard the other

night?"

That Kirwan's preaching was attended by immense congregations is

unquestionable; and that his collections were very large is equally

true. But there were circumstances remarkably in favour of both. He

preached but three or four times in the year, and he never preached but

for charities patronised by the highest personages of the land. The

Lord-lieutenant and the principal nobility were generally the patrons

of those especial charities. There was this additional advantage, that

then poor-laws in Ireland were unknown, and public liberality was thus

the more urgently required, and the more willingly exercised. The day

of his preaching was in general an _anniversary_; for which the whole

preceding year was a preparation; and the collection was thus, in a

certain degree, the payment of a rent.

The magnitude of his collections has been the subject of some erroneous

conjectures. On the occasion of his preaching for the families of the

yeomanry who fell in the rebellion of 1798--a memorable and melancholy

occasion, which naturally called forth the national liberality--the

collection was said to have amounted to a thousand pounds. A very large

sum, but it was a national contribution.

Kirwan's style of delivery, too, had some share in his popular

effect--he _recited_ his sermons in the manner of the French preachers;

and the novelty formed a striking contrast to the dreary reading of the

ordinary preachers. He was also fond of lashing public transgressions,

and the vices of high life were constantly the subject of sharp

remarks, which even stooped to the dresses of the women. The nobility,

accordingly, came to hear themselves attacked; and, as all personality

was avoided, they came to be amused.

Still, Kirwan was a remarkable man, and worthy of mention in any volume

which treats of the memorable personages of Ireland.

We wish that we could avoid speaking of his treatment by the Church

dignitaries of his time. While they ought to have received such a

convert with honour, they seem to have made a point of neglecting him.

He was not merely a man of talent in the pulpit, but alike accomplished

in science and elegant literature; for he had been successively

_Professor_ of Rhetoric, and of Natural Philosophy, in (if we recollect

rightly) the College of Louvain, at a time when French Mathematics were

the pride of the Continent.

Yet he never obtained preferment or countenance, and scarcely even

civility, except the extorted civility of fear, from any of the

ecclesiastical heads of Ireland. The dull and common-place men,

with whom it was then customary to fill the Irish Sees, shrank from

one who might have been a most willing, as he must have been a most

able, instrument in reconciling his Papist countrymen to the Church

of England. And, without any other cause than their own somnolent

stupidity, they rendered wholly useless--as far as was in their

power--a man who, in a position corresponding to his ability, might

have headed a New Reformation in Ireland.

Kirwan's only dignity was given to him by the Lord-lieutenant,

Cornwallis, after nearly fifteen years of thankless labour; and it

consisted only of the poor Deanery of Killala, a nook on the savage

shore of Western Ireland. He died soon after, of a _coup-de-soleil_--as

it was observed the natural death of a man of his genius!

But we must break off from this captivating volume. We recollect no

political work in which politics are treated with more manly propriety,

or personal character delineated with more vigorous truth; in which

happier anecdotes abound, or in which the writer gives his own opinion

with more firmness, yet with less offence to public feelings. From

its evident knowledge of Ireland, it could be written by none but an

Irishman; but its sentiments are cosmopolite. If the author sails

under his national flag, still, his bark must be recognised as a noble

vessel, and welcome in any Port of the World.

FOOTNOTES:

[18] _Curran and his Contemporaries._ By CHARLES PHILLIPS, Esq., A.B.,

one of her Majesty's Commissioners in the Court for the Relief of

Insolvent Debtors. 1 vol. 8vo. 1850.

LORD HOLLAND'S FOREIGN REMINISCENCES.[19]

There is no pleasanter kind of reading than a good personal memoir.

Works of this description serve a double purpose; for they not only

convey to us most lively impressions of society, illustrated with

portraits of the most eminent and remarkable men of the time, but,

taken in the aggregate, they furnish the best and most authentic store

of materials available to the future historian. Ponderous or brilliant,

gossiping or grave, according to the peculiar style and idiosyncrasy of

their writers, they have all claims to our notice; and more than one

posthumous reputation has been achieved through compositions such as

these, by men whose other labours have failed to attract the slightest

share of the public notice or approbation.

But even in this light walk of literature, there are certain conditions

which must be observed, in order to excite interest and to insure

success. We expect from the compiler of memoirs a narrative, however

desultory, of what passed before his own observation. He must not

be altogether a reporter at second-hand--a mere relater of stories

or scandals which he has chanced to pick up from others--a dilator,

through simple hearsay, of closet or antechamber gossip. The substance

at least of his tale must be derived from his personal knowledge, else

we have no voucher at all for the authenticity of what he is pleased

to relate. The memoirs, in short, must be his own, not fragments from

those of other people.

The announcement of the publication of a volume of Memoirs or

Reminiscences from the pen of the late Lord Holland could hardly have

failed to stimulate the public curiosity. His known intimacy with many

of the leading characters of the last generation, his near relationship

to the most conspicuous of modern Whig statesmen, his inclination

towards letters--which made him appear the centre of a certain

literary coterie--were all so many distinct pledges for the value of

his literary legacy. True, Byron in his early satire had irreverently

scoffed at the reunions of Holland House, and thrown no slight degree

of ridicule on the fame of that rising academy; but the satire served

at the same time to commemorate the hospitality of the noble Mæcenas.

We observe that a critic in the last number of the _Edinburgh Review_

is still magniloquent on this theme. With the savour of past banquets

still lingering in his nostrils, he manfully declares his intention of

being impartial, nay stern, in the execution of his censorial duty;

and attempts to persuade us, as he is persuaded himself, "that the

very prepossessions which we feel, and have endeavoured to describe,

have been disadvantageous rather than favourable to the author." If

so, the inevitable conclusion must be, that the critic is a monster

of ingratitude. Had he contented himself with simply stating that

no amount of dinners, no extent of hospitalities received, should

influence his judgment one whit in favour of the book, the declaration,

with some due allowance of course for the frailties of human nature,

might have been accepted. But when he tells us that, _because_ he was

a guest at the table of the late Lord Holland, and admitted, as he

insinuates, to his intimacy, his prepossessions are disadvantageous to

the author, he is either writing egregious nonsense, or conveying the

reverse of a compliment.

"Had the work," says he, "been anonymous, or had it proceeded--like

many of those innumerable books miscalled histories--from the

Palais Royal or the quays of Paris, we are inclined to think that

a more favourable judgment might have been formed of it, than when

every sentence, nay, almost every line, is weighed against the high

reputation of the author, and the anticipations of readers _like

ourselves_."

The majority of the reading public, however, are by no means in

the exalted position of the critic, who, by the way, was under no

obligation whatever to review the book, if, on perusal, he found

its contents fall greatly short of his expectations. What he means

by talking about publications issuing "from the Palais Royal or the

quays of Paris" we cannot exactly divine, unless he wishes us to

understand that the _Foreign Reminiscences_ intrinsically belong to

the same class of writings--an opinion in which we thoroughly agree.

Such twaddle as this is altogether superfluous. The public generally

has no prepossession either the one way or the other. The name of Lord

Holland is known to them as that of a man who moved in a distinguished

sphere of society, and who must, in his own day, have seen much which

was worth narrating. They have no means of weighing his conversation

against his writings; they accept the latter when laid before them, and

will judge of them strictly according to their actual value.

It appears that the present volume constitutes but a small part of

Lord Holland's written Memoirs. The reason why it is given to us at

the present time is set forth in the Preface, which, being short, we

transcribe entire.

"The recent events on the Continent have induced the editor to

publish the following pages on foreign politics. The time of which

this volume treats has already acquired the interest of a long

past age; and the public will read with pleasure, and perhaps with

profit, the observations on passing events of a contemporary who,

if not wholly impartial, is acknowledged by all who knew him to

have been as candid as he was benevolent.

"The editor has scrupulously abstained from making the slightest

verbal alteration in the text or notes. The omission of four

insignificant sentences is all that he has deemed necessary for

the immediate publication of what was probably written with the

intention of not seeing the light so soon."

We must fairly confess that this preface stimulated our curiosity

still further. From it we understood that the _Reminiscences_ were to

have some practical bearing upon the events which have taken place on

the Continent during the last three years--that they would throw some

additional light upon the causes which have led to so many dynastic

convulsions. Our disappointment therefore was proportionably great,

when, on perusing the work, we discovered that not a single page

of it was calculated to assist us in any such researches, and that

even the observations on passing events were of the most meagre and

unsatisfactory description. What especial purpose the publication of

this volume, apart from the remainder of the Memoirs, could serve at

the present, or indeed at any other time, we are wholly at a loss to

conceive. It treats of no topic which has not been long ago exhausted,

contains hardly any personal narrative, and affords us not one single

atom of novel information. As a repertory of anecdotes it is singularly

worthless. We allude to such anecdotes as may be considered authentic,

or at least tolerably so--anecdotes, for example, communicated to the

author by Talleyrand, and one or two other foreign statesmen with

whom, in later years, he was acquainted. But there is another class of

anecdotes, or pseudo-anecdotes, which we cannot pass over even with so

slight a censure. We allude to the revelations of private intrigue,

on which the author dwells with a zest which to us seems peculiarly

offensive. Until we saw this volume, we could not have believed that

one British peer would have penned, and another have published, such a

tissue of scandals, emanating from discarded serving-women and court

menials, and reflecting directly on the honour of some of the first

houses of Europe. We are at no loss to discover where the omissions

mentioned in the preface are made, or what was the nature of the

passages expunged. It would perhaps have been better, where the inuendo

is retained, to have preserved the details, in order that they might

have been strictly tested. It is, we think, no proper concession to

delicacy to find lines of asterisks following a direct charge against

the virtue of Marie Antoinette, or the legitimacy of the Duchess of

York; or to have a page of such mysterious symbols inserted immediately

after the notice of the marriage of Ferdinand VII. of Spain. Lord

Holland should have been allowed to tell his own story, if not in

justice to the memory of the ladies whose chastity is called in

question, at least that we know the true bent of the imagination of

the noble author, and appreciate "that humorous pleasantry, guided by

good sense and wisdom, and raised above vulgar irony or personality,"

which his eulogist in the _Edinburgh Review_ is pleased to claim as

his attributes. It is difficult to understand why, in one case, there

should be an evident suppression, whilst, in another, anecdotes of an

offensive nature, reflecting upon the conduct of a queen, are printed

without the slightest reserve, introduced in the following highly

satisfactory manner:--"A story was current at Madrid, which, _if true_,

would at once prove that the Prince of the Peace was aware of her

infidelities," &c., and followed by this commentary--"the anecdote is,

perhaps, too dramatic to deserve implicit credit." If so, why was it

written down, and why is it now published? The appetite for prurient

details which is a main feature of this book, is perhaps intelligible

when it relates to intrigues notorious to all the world. No man of a

really refined or fastidious mind would have committed these details

to paper, more especially when they bore reference to the family of an

individual with whom he was on something like intimate terms. But the

case is far worse, and can admit of no palliation, when we find the

most infamous charges, which have never been supported by even a shadow

of proof, deliberately revived and repeated against that heroic and

unfortunate lady, Queen Marie Antoinette of France. If the lament of

Burke for the wane of chivalry was felt, not as a brilliant diatribe,

but as a cutting sarcasm at the time when it was first enunciated, how

much more appropriate is it now, when we find that a member of the

British peerage--a man thought to be distinguished for high sentiment

and generous sympathy--did not hesitate to adopt in the solitude of his

closet the shameless inventions of the French revolutionary rabble; and

that these are now given as facts which will not admit of questioning

or denial to the world!

We are extremely glad to observe that the writer in the _Edinburgh

Review_ has had the proper spirit to refute--and he does it most

satisfactorily--this wretched and scandalous attack upon the memory of

a royal lady. It was not perhaps to be expected that he should do more;

but what sort of imputation does his vindication of the Queen leave

upon the character of her assailant? This is not a matter which should

be passed over lightly; and for our part we feel bound to say that we

can conceive no spectacle more pitiable or humiliating, than that of an

old man committing with a palsied hand to paper the prurient rumours

of the past. Had the evidence against Marie Antoinette been ten times

stronger than it was, honour and the feelings of a gentleman should

have deterred any one even from repeating the accusation. But the late

Lord Holland entertained no such scruples. His witness, at second-hand,

is the very woman who wrote _Mémoires sur la Vie Privée de Marie

Antoinette, Reine de France_; and in these memoirs of hers there is not

even an inuendo against the honour of the unfortunate Queen. But Madame

Campan cannot so escape. Lord Holland was determined that she should,

in some way or other, assist in blackening the reputation of her royal

mistress; and accordingly we are treated to the following ingenuous

note:--

"Madame Campan's delicacy and discretion are not only pardonable,

but praiseworthy; but they are disingenuous, and her Memoirs

conceal truths well known to her, though such as would have been

unbecoming a lady to reveal. She was, in fact, the _confidante_

of Marie Antoinette's amours. These amours were not numerous,

scandalous, or degrading, but they _were amours_. Madame Campan,

who lived beyond the Restoration, was not so mysterious in

conversation on these subjects as she is in her writings. She

acknowledged to persons, who have acknowledged it to me, that she

was privy to the intercourse between the Queen and the Duc de

Coigny."

And this is evidence upon which we are to condemn Marie Antoinette!

I had it--says this distinct and confident accuser--from other

people, who had it from the waiting-woman, although the waiting-woman

knew better than to write it down! And who were the people "who

acknowledged it to me"--what was their character and station--what

was their repute for credibility? Lord Holland durst not in his

lifetime have said as much of the father or mother of any man of his

acquaintance upon such a pretext for authority. It is altogether the

very worst instance of a wanton attack which we ever remember to have

met with: it has but one parallel in history--the famous warming-pan

legend, by means of which Lord Holland's political predecessors sought

to bastardise the son of James II. But the motive which dictated the

earlier fiction is wanting in the case of the later one.

Let us not be misunderstood. The case stands thus: Lord Holland has

made a grievous charge against the honour of the murdered Queen of

France. He says that he believes that charge to be true, and he states

the grounds of his belief. They are these: A lady, who wrote the

memoirs of her mistress's private life, in which no hint of criminal

conduct appears, told other persons (who are nameless) who told him,

Lord Holland, that the Queen had been guilty of adultery. Far be it

from us to doubt the honour of a British peer. But, rather than doubt

the honour of Marie Antoinette, we should doubt the fact of Lord

Holland having received any such statement from any human being. Who

were the indiscreet friends of Madame Campan that conveyed to his ear

the hitherto undivulged secret? Were they old menials of the French

court--retired waiting-women--confidential lacqueys--or persons who had

the _entrée_ to Holland House? Surely, when the honour of a Queen is

impeached, we are entitled to know the authority. No authority of any

kind is given. On the _ipse dixit_ of Lord Holland rests the entire

substantiation of the charge, and on his memory must lie the stigma of

having revived the gross and unmanly calumny.

We have felt ourselves bound to say this much, because, if stories

of this sort are to be accepted as authentic contributions to

history, there is no imaginable kind of falsehood which may not

be promulgated as truth. Apply the rule to private life, and the

malignity of a discarded butler would be sufficient to taint the best

blood in England. What would we think of memoirs, compiled by some

man of considerable standing and celebrity, and published under the

editorship of his son, which should tell us that the present inheritor

of any noble title was a bastard and an intruder, on such authority

as this--that somebody had told the writer, that somebody else had

told him or her, that she was cognisant of a certain intrigue? Yet

the two cases are much the same. If they differ at all, it is in this

particular, that the original testimony of the "somebody," who in

the instance of the Queen of France was Madame Campan, happens to be

written and published, and to contain no insinuation whatever; whereas,

in the case we have supposed, that negative vindication would almost

certainly be wanting. Who, we ask, would dare, on such authority,

to set down such accusations against any private family? and, if we

are right in thinking that public indignation would most certainly

overwhelm the retailer of such miserable calumny, why should any other

rule be applied when royalty is the subject of the attack?

We suspect that Lord Holland's political friends will hardly thank his

successor for the publication of this volume. It exhibits the late peer

in what we must suppose to be his true colours, not as a constitutional

Whig, nor as in any way attached to the recognised forms of the British

Constitution, but as an admirer of principles which would necessarily

tend to its overthrow. We have searched the work in vain for a single

expression of anything which we can venture to designate as patriotic

feeling. Kings and courts are condemned by him--what sympathy he has

is bestowed on the agents of revolution--and he appears a eulogist,

or at least apologist, of the very man whom Whig and Tory alike have

agreed in branding with reprobation. The conduct of "Egalité," in

voting for the death of his cousin, Louis XVI., appears to him not

unnatural. He takes great pains to convince us that the infamous duke

was an exceedingly maligned person; and, with characteristic judgment

as to the nature of his evidence, cites "a short narrative written by

Mrs Elliott, who had, I believe, lived with him," as an apology for an

act which, even in the French Revolutionary Convention, called forth an

exclamation of horror.

Lord Holland's personal experiences--we should rather call them

reminiscences--connected with the French Revolution, were very meagre.

He was then, (in 1791,) as he tells us, a mere boy, and not likely to

have much cognisance of the state of political affairs. In consequence,

we gain absolutely nothing from his observation. Neither was his

sojourn in Prussia, during the ensuing year, more fruitful save in the

article of scandal, of which we have said enough. The same remark will

apply to his Spanish tour; from the records of which, if we abstract

the personal and indecent details, not one word of interest remains.

This strikes us as very singular. A young and well-educated man,

traversing those countries at a time when they widely differed in their

aspect and forms of society from those which they afterwards assumed,

ought surely to have preserved some "Reminiscences" of their condition,

which would have been more acceptable to posterity than stories of

court adultery, which he hardly could have derived from any creditable

source; and we fairly confess that the total omission of anything

like practical details, goes far to convince us that Byron's early

judgment was right, and that the fame of Holland House rested far more

upon the Amphytrionic, than the natural or acquired accomplishments

of the distinguished host. In fact, were it not remarkable for such

disgraceful scandal as would lower the character of a theatrical

green-room, the first half of this volume is entirely beneath contempt.

It has nothing whatever to do with the present crisis of affairs--it

refers in no way to national or dynastical interests--it is simply

a collection of such trash as, thirty years ago, might have been

published under the auspices of a noble name, and then have descended

to the hands of the trunk-maker, without the slightest chance of a

second resurrection.

But the other half of the volume remains yet to be noticed. It is

devoted exclusively to the Emperor Napoleon Buonaparte, whom Lord

Holland appears to have regarded with the most profound admiration.

We approached this part of the book with sharpened curiosity, hoping

to find recorded some additional traits of that remarkable character;

but again we were doomed to disappointment. Lord Holland's personal

recollections of the Emperor are contained in the following passage:--

"Both Lady Holland and myself were presented to him in 1802, when

he was First Consul. He saw her only once, and addressed some usual

questions and compliments to her, but had no conversation; though

I have reason to believe that he was aware of the admiration she

entertained and avowed for his military and political genius. I

stood next to him in the circle when he received and answered, in a

short written speech, (hastily, and somewhat awkwardly delivered,)

the deputation headed by Barthelemi, which came to confer upon him

the consulship for life. He spoke very civilly, but very little

to me on that occasion; and scarcely more when I dined and passed

the evening at his court, in company with Mr Fox, with whom he

conversed at considerable length on various matters, and more

particularly on the Concordat. These were the only opportunities

I ever had of observing his countenance or hearing his voice. The

former, though composed of regular features, and both penetrating

and good-humoured, was neither so dignified nor so animated as I

had expected; but the latter was sweet, spirited, and persuasive

in the highest degree, and gave a favourable impression of his

disposition as well as of his understanding. His manner was

neither affected nor assuming, but certainly wanted that ease and

attraction which the early habits of good company are supposed

exclusively to confer."

Interchanges of civilities, however, continued to take place. Lady

Holland transmitted to the Emperor, when at Elba, "one or two packets

of English newspapers," and these little acts of attention were

acknowledged by "some small but curious specimens of the iron ore of

that island." Her Ladyship's subsequent solicitude for the comforts

of Napoleon, when exiled at St Helena, and her generous attention to

his wants, are well known, and exhibit, in a most pleasing manner,

the kindliness of the female heart. The mention of these things leads

to an account of the Longwood squabbles, the interest of which has

now entirely passed away. Sir Hudson Lowe may not have been the most

courteous or _debonnaire_ of wardens, but, on the other hand, it is

clear that Napoleon would have made a point of quarreling with an angel

of light if appointed as his _custos_; and that the last passages of

his life by no means exhibit him in a dignified or magnanimous point of

view. As, however, the narrative to which we refer is one of the few in

this volume which are based upon Lord Holland's own experience, we may

as well insert it here as a specimen of the author's style.

"When the ungenerous decision by which this great prisoner was

to be conveyed to St Helena was known, Lady Holland hastened to

apply to Government for permission to send such articles as in her

judgment were likely to contribute to his comfort or amusement

in that distant exile. She improved her slight acquaintance with

Sir Hudson Lowe, and, by every civility in her power, endeavoured

to obtain from him all the facilities consistent with his duty,

and instructions for carrying her intentions into execution. She

failed in both these attempts. Lord Bathurst informed her that no

present could be sent to General Buonaparte, but that Government

would willingly purchase and convey to him any article that could

be suggested as conducive to his comfort. Lady Holland happened

to know that the Emperor liked, even in less sultry climates, to

drink both water and wine extremely cold. She had been on the point

of buying, at a considerable price, a newly-invented machine for

making ice; and, in answer to Lord Bathurst's message, she gave

him the direction of the maker, and suggested the purchase. The

machine, however, was neither purchased nor sent. Lady Holland

nevertheless persisted, and contrived to send, together with new

publications and trifling presents to Sir Hudson, similar marks of

remembrance to Napoleon. They were often delayed, from excessive

scruple or from less pardonable motives, at the Government House;

yet the innocent nature of the memorials themselves secured their

ultimately reaching their destination. Various obstacles, however,

presented themselves to this insignificant intercourse. A natural

and pardonable pride deterred Napoleon from applying for anything;

a more mistaken, and in my judgment contemptible, punctilio led him

to reject any communication in which his title of Emperor was not

preserved. Advantage was taken of such circumstances--"

No; in mercy to the compositors, we shall not go on with this! The pen

drops from the fingers, and a drowsy sense of numbness steals upon the

brain in the mere act of transcribing these ponderous and most prosy

sentences. Skip we a couple of pages still occupied by the recital

of such unutterable woes, and let us arrive at the period of better

treatment--"the effect, I flatter myself, of my motion in the House of

Lords."

"Letters from the Emperor's family, intrusted to the Secretary of

State, were henceforward more regularly transmitted. Provisions,

clothing, and books, purchased by them, and sent to the same

office, were also forwarded; and Lord Bathurst, some time

afterwards, not only consented to convey articles from Lady Holland

to Napoleon and Sir Hudson Lowe, but apprised her regularly of

ships that sailed for St Helena, and, after due experience of her

scrupulous adherence to the rules which he imposed, allowed all

parcels, books, and cases indorsed with her handwriting and name,

to proceed, without further inspection, to their destination.

Lady Holland had the satisfaction of knowing that many of those

articles were received and approved of. Napoleon never wrote,

but he mentioned her name and her attentions more than once to

persons who repeated his acknowledgments to her. The legacy was,

however, a gratifying, and, by her, an unexpected proof that such

endeavours to express her admiration of his great qualities,

and even to soothe his afflictions, had not been altogether

unsuccessful. The testimony of his own handwriting, the words

so judiciously chosen--even the pains taken to fit the card to

the box--enhanced the value of the bequest; for they proved that

Napoleon understood her motives, and that they had occupied, for

some little space of time, the thoughts, as well as excited the

good-will, of that extraordinary man. The whole was in good taste.

Had the gift been greater, she could not have accepted it; had the

expressions been stronger, they would not have appeared sincere.

Surely to have afforded satisfaction to a man so calumniated, so

persecuted, and so ill treated, and to have excited the esteem of

a mind so capacious and so penetrating, is no slight distinction.

Lady Holland found, in the knowledge of it, an ample reward for

her constant, unremitting, and unostentatious compassion and

generosity."

Our readers will probably agree with us in thinking that there is

"something too much of this." It is rather a novelty to us to be

informed that Napoleon was a persecuted man. Most people throughout

Europe have maintained the opinion that the persecution lay the other

way. But perhaps Lord Holland meant to insinuate that the persecution

lay in his banishment of St Helena. He calls it an "ungenerous

decision;" and elsewhere says:--

"It is remarkable that, in one of those papers so sent (to Elba)

by Lady Holland, was a paragraph hinting a project among the

confederates of transporting him to St Helena. True it is that

such an idea, however inconsistent with honour or good faith, was

started and discussed, though probably never committed to paper,

at the Congress of Vienna, before Napoleon left Elba. It is just

to add that it was discountenanced and rejected by Austria. In

confirmation of so base a design having been entertained, it

is observable that a negotiation with the East India Company

to place St Helena under the control of the Government, with

no other probable or ostensible object for such a measure, was

actually commenced in March 1815, and discontinued on the landing

of Napoleon in that month. Any well-grounded suspicion of such a

proceeding was sufficient to release the exiled Emperor from the

obligations of his treaty and abdication of Fontainebleau, and to

justify his attempt to recover the empire he had so recently lost."

We observe that the writer in the _Edinburgh Review_ denies the

statement of Lord Holland, that the removal of Napoleon from Elba was

mooted at the Congress of Vienna. We, on the contrary, have always

understood that the proposition was seriously considered, though

not, as Lord Holland would insinuate, without sufficient cause and

provocation. The intrigues, of which Elba was the centre, to pave the

way for another attempt at the dethronement of the Bourbons, had for

some time been in active progress, and were well known to Fouché and

others, and by them communicated to the Congress. Also, the attitude

of Murat in Italy was such as to excite very serious apprehensions. Mr

Alison, in his _History of Europe_,[20] thus notices the intrigues of

Elba:--

"Its close proximity to the Italian shore led naturally to a secret

correspondence between the Island of Elba and the Court of Naples.

Murat, ever governed by ambition, and yet destitute of the firmness

of purpose requisite to render it successful, now found that his

vacillation of conduct had ruined him with the aristocratic, as

it had formerly done with the revolutionary party, and that the

Allies were little disposed to reward his deviation from his

engagements by the lasting possession of the throne of Naples. He

threw himself, therefore, once more into the arms of France; and it

was arranged that the descent of Napoleon on the coast of Provence

should be contemporaneous with the advance of his troops to the Po,

and the proclamation of the great principle of Italian liberty and

independence."

Accordingly, we find that Murat, only ten days before Napoleon quitted

Elba, made a formal demand for the passage of eighty thousand men

through the Austrian territories in Italy--an act, doubtless, of

insane folly, but one which can be attributed to no other motive than

his perfect knowledge that the designs of Napoleon were nearly ripe

for execution. This demand, of course, could not fail to alarm the

Congress, to whom, almost immediately afterwards, information as to the

character of the projected enterprise was conveyed. Mr Alison says:--

"This military position and demand excited the jealousy of the

Allied Powers; the more especially as, towards the end of February,

rumours reached Vienna of constant correspondence between the Isle

of Elba and the adjoining shores of Italy, and of an intended

descent by Napoleon on the shores of France. These rumours soon

acquired such consistency, that the propriety of removing him

from the neighbourhood of Italy had already been more than once

agitated in the Congress; and various places of residence for him,

in exchange for Elba, had been proposed;--among others, one of the

Canary Islands, which was suggested by the Portuguese Minister, and

St Helena or St Lucia, which were proposed by Lord Castlereagh.

Alexander, however, still firmly held out for adhering to the

treaty of Fontainebleau, and maintaining the fallen Emperor in

possession of the Island of Elba: alleging, as a reason, that his

personal honour had been pledged to his great antagonist for that

asylum, and that he would not be the first to break it."[21]

On the 7th of March, intelligence reached Vienna that Napoleon had

secretly left Elba. Such we believe to be the true statement of the

case. That the Allies should have wished, without any adequate cause,

to disturb the recent settlement of Napoleon in the Island of Elba,

appears to us a proposition too preposterous to be maintained. But that

such a measure should have been discussed, _after_ they became aware

of the nature of his designs and preparations, and had thus received

warning that the peace of Europe was again in imminent danger from

his uncontrollable ambition, need not excite any wonder, and cannot

surely be wrested into a charge of persecution against Napoleon. Lord

Holland entirely fails to make out--nay, he does not even assert--that

any such proposal was made in Congress _before_ the intrigues of Elba

were divulged, or the negotiation with Murat completed. It does not

even appear that Napoleon, previous to his landing in France, was aware

that the Allies had received any intimation of his design; and when we

consider the shortness of time which elapsed between the receipt of

Murat's formal demand and the departure from Porto Ferrajo, it is next

to impossible that any tidings of a discussion following thereon could

have reached him while in Elba. In short, this attempt to justify the

evasion of Napoleon, and his deliberate breach of treaty, is a signal

failure, and will certainly add nothing to Lord Holland's posthumous

renown for historical accuracy or acumen.

But Lord Holland also considers Napoleon as entitled to deep sympathy

on the ground of his being ill-treated. That is a matter entirely

of private opinion. That Lord Bathurst should not have purchased

Lady Holland's machine for making ice may appear, in the eyes of the

frequenters of Holland House, a most barbarous act of cruelty. That a

special vessel should not have been despatched for St Helena, so often

as a letter was addressed to the illustrious captive, may shock the

sensitive mind. The liberal soul may be thrilled with anguish and pity

at the perusal of the following miseries inflicted on the devastator of

Europe towards the close of his career:--

"It was indispensable to the peace of the world to prevent his

escape; and the expedition from Elba had shown that no reliance

could be placed either on his professions or his treaties.

Detention and sure custody, therefore, were unavoidable; and every

comfort consistent with these objects was afforded him by the

British Government. He was allowed the society of the friends who

had accompanied him in his exile; he had books in abundance to

amuse his leisure hours; saddle-horses in profusion were at his

command; he was permitted to ride several miles in one direction;

Champagne and Burgundy were his daily beverage; and the bill of

fare of his table, which is shown by Las Cases as a proof of the

severity of the British Government, would be thought the height

of luxury by most persons in a state of liberty. If the English

Government had acted towards Napoleon as he did to others who

opposed him, they would have shot him in the first ditch, as he did

the Duc d'Enghien or Hofer; or shut him up in an Alpine fortress,

as he did the Cardinal Pacca."[22]

But we have really dwelt too long upon this tedious exhibition of

spurious sympathy, which, after all, is but a flimsy veil intended

to cover the self-glorification of the peer. The remaining passages

regarding Napoleon contain nothing of the slightest interest, and are,

moreover, especially heavy. A few commentaries upon various remarkable

incidents in the life of the Emperor are interspersed, from which we

learn that Lord Holland condemned the murder of the Duc d'Enghien, but

did not consider the abandonment of Josephine as any heinous act of

moral dereliction. We doubt whether the majority of mankind will concur

in the latter opinion. To us it appears that Napoleon's treatment

of his first wife shows him to have been as destitute of heart as

insensible to the obligations of honour.

It is not a little amusing to observe the estimate formed by Lord

Holland of some of his remarkable contemporaries. Occasionally he

assumes a tranquil air of superiority, which, when we remember the

even obscurity of his own life, in respect to the discharge of public

duties, is comical in the extreme. Mark how he disposes of Prince

Metternich:--

"That minister, originally a partisan of the French faction, and

then a tool of Napoleon, has, no doubt, since the fall of that

great prince, supported the system which succeeded him. He seems

hardly qualified by any superior genius to assume the ascendency,

in the councils of his own and neighbouring nations, which common

rumour has for some years attributed to him. He appeared to me,

in the very short intercourse I had with him, little superior

to the common run of Continental politicians and courtiers, and

clearly inferior to the Emperor of Russia in those qualities

which secure an influence in great affairs. Some who admit the

degrading but too prevalent opinion, that a disregard of truth

is useful and necessary in the government of mankind, have, on

that score, maintained the contrary proposition. His manners

are reckoned insinuating. In my slight acquaintance with him in

London, I was not struck with them; they seemed such as might have

been expected from a German who had studied French vivacity in

the fashionable novel of the day. I saw little of a sagacious and

observant statesman, or of a courtier accustomed to very refined

and enlightened society."

What will the _crême de la crême_ of Vienna say to this? Here is

a decided thrust at the midriff of the enemy! Not only is Prince

Metternich set down as an exceedingly overrated person in point of

ability, but his very manners and demeanour have been criticised in

the polite circles of Holland House, and found wanting. We cannot

sufficiently applaud the sagacity with which the true source of the

Metternichian polish is detected. Truth will out at last! During the

later years of his life, the Prince has been studying French vivacity

in the classical academies of Pigault le Brun and Paul de Kock! And

yet, perhaps, we may be wrong. Louvet was the earlier master, and may

have had a hand in forming the vivacity of this distinguished pupil.

But the Prince has this consolation, at least, that he suffers in good

company. Tried by the unerring standard of Lord Holland, "the address

of Alexander himself, the Emperor of Russia, was, perhaps, liable to

similar criticism." The inference is, that the Czar also had been

studying vivacity in French novels, and was obviously not a person

accustomed to very refined and enlightened society! As for the Emperor

Francis II., he is dismissed in a still more summary manner:--

"I have heard it observed, and I believe justly, that the Emperor

passed, during his long reign, for a weak, foolish, but good sort

of man; but that he deserved none of those epithets. He was a man

of some understanding, little feeling, and no justice."

Perhaps the reader would take a glimpse at the royal family of

Portugal, as seen through the critical glasses of Lord Holland:--

"The king and queen, very opposite in principle, character, and

conduct, have a natural abhorrence to one another. They, in truth,

have nothing in common but a revolting ugliness of person, and

a great awkwardness of manner. He is well-meaning, but weak and

cowardly, and so apprehensive of being governed by his ostensible

ministers, that he becomes the victim of low and obscure cabals,

and renders his councils at all times unsteady, irresolute, and

uncertain. The queen's outrageous zeal in the cause of despotism,

miscalled legitimacy, is supposed to have softened his aversion to

a representative assembly and a constitutional form of government.

The queen is vindictive, ambitious, and selfish, and has strong

propensities to every kind of intrigue, political or amorous."

What a sensation of awe steals across the mind as we peruse these

wholesale sentences of condemnation! What a sublime idea we imbibe of

the dignity and intellect of the judge! We need not add further to this

portrait gallery, although ample materials are afforded us. The above

specimens, we think, will be sufficient to satiate the curiosity of the

reader.

Lord Holland, however, had his favourites. Napoleon, as we have seen,

was one; and Talleyrand was another. It is rather odd that Lord Holland

should have discerned in the latter one pre-eminent and distinguishing

quality, for which no one else ever gave him the slightest credit--we

mean a high regard for truth.

"Talleyrand," says he, "was initiated into public affairs under

M. de Calonne, and learned from that lively minister the happy

facility of transacting business without effort and without

ceremony in the corner of a drawing-room, or in the recess of a

window. In the exercise of that talent, he equalled the readiness

and surpassed the wit of his model; but he brought to his work

some commodities which the latter could never supply--viz. _great

veracity_, discretion, and foresight."

And again, in a note:--

"My general and long observation of Talleyrand's VERACITY, in great

and small matters, makes me confident his relation is correct. He

may as much, _or more_ than other diplomatists, suppress what is

true; _I am quite satisfied he never actually says what is false,

though he may occasionally imply it_."

It is a pity that an ordinary acquaintance with the significance of

terms was not among the accomplishments of Lord Holland. Here we have

the two leading elements of falsehood--the _suppressio veri_, and the

_suggestio falsi_--plainly admitted; and yet we are told in the same

breath, that the man who recoiled from neither practice was a person

of great veracity! One or two hackneyed and rather poor _bon-mots_

of Talleyrand are quoted in the text, as instances of his remarkable

wit;--had he never enunciated anything better, he certainly would not

have achieved his great renown as a conversationalist. He appears,

however, to have enchanted Lord Holland, who cites his authority on all

occasions with an implicit trustfulness which we cannot sufficiently

admire.

We must be allowed to remark that, in this instance also, Lord Holland

has chosen an odd method of testifying his respect for the memory of

a friend. In whatever liberties of speech a famous wit may choose to

indulge with reference to his own domestic relations, we are yet sure

that he by no means intends these to form part of the common currency

of conversation, and that he will not feel peculiarly obliged to any

one who gratuitously undertakes to circulate them. The sarcasm of

Talleyrand with regard to the intellectual deficiencies of the lady

who afterwards became his wife, was not, we presume, intended for

repetition, though Lord Holland carefully preserves it. Good taste,

we think, would have suggested its omission; but if our scruples upon

that point should be thought to savour too much of Puritanism, of this

at least we are certain, that no living relative of M. de Talleyrand

will feel indebted to Lord Holland for the manner in which the secret

history of his marriage is related:--

"It is generally thought that he (Talleyrand) negotiated his

return to France through Madame de Stael. He was on intimate terms

with her, but had abandoned her society for that of Madame Grand

before the peace of 1802, when I saw him again at Paris. It became

necessary, on the conclusion of the _Concordat_, that he should

either revert to the habits and character of a prelate, or receive

a dispensation from all the duties and obligations of the order.

He chose the latter. But Buonaparte, who affected at that time to

restore great decorum in his Consular court, somewhat maliciously

insisted either on the dismissal of Madame Grand, or his public

nuptials with that lady. The questionable nature of her divorce

from Mr Grand created some obstacle to such a union. It was curious

to see Sir Elijah Impey, the judge who had granted her husband

damages in India for her infidelity, caressed at her little court

at Neuilly. His testimony was deemed essential, and he was not

disposed to withhold it, because, notwithstanding his denial of

riches in the House of Commons, he was at that very time urging

a claim on the French Government to indemnify him for his losses

in their funds. Mr (Sir Philip) Francis, her paramour, then at

Paris also, did not fail to draw the attention of Englishmen to

the circumstance, though he was not himself admitted at Neuilly

to complete the curious group with his judicial enemy and quondam

mistress."

Pleasant reading this! It may be said that the facts were long ago

notorious, and that they are to be found in more than one scandalous

chronicle. That may possibly be the case; but surely it can afford

no apology for this elaborate repetition on the part of a friend. Is

history served by such contributions? Does society benefit by their

preservation?

The passion of the past generation for collecting and retailing

_bon-mots_ was carried to an extravagant length. Such a man as

Talleyrand was a perfect treasure to any coterie, for his established

reputation gave to every sentence which he uttered more than its

intrinsic value. But we often find that sayings which appear most

brilliant in conversation, lose their lustre when committed to writing,

after the occasion which called them forth has passed away. Therefore

we do not attach any very exorbitant value to their collection,

especially when they are flavoured, as it is too often the case, with

coarseness and personality. The writer in the _Edinburgh Review_

expresses a wish "that Lord Holland, who possessed more opportunities

than any other man for collecting and stringing these conversational

pearls, had been more diligent in so agreeable a vocation." Judging

from the specimens which are given, we do not think that the world has

sustained any great loss from the negligence of the noble peer; for

some of those which have escaped oblivion, bear unmistakable symptoms

of the decomposition of the heap from which they were originally culled.

In short, we feel ourselves compelled to say that we cannot consider

this volume as an important or even creditable contribution to the

historical literature of the country. Those portions of it which do

not directly offend, are so uninteresting and destitute of the charms

of style, that they act as a positive soporific; and, but for the

indignation excited by the more objectionable passages, we doubt very

much whether we could have had patience enough to peruse it from the

title-page to the close. We are not sure whether we even understand the

meaning of several sentences, or whether they really were intended to

convey any meaning at all. Possibly the fault lies with us. We may be

either too dull, or too unversed in the occult innuendos of diplomatic

society, to perceive what is clear and perspicuous to those who have

enjoyed superior advantages. Nevertheless, we would give a trifle

to any one who should enlighten us upon the point of relationship

suggested by the following paragraph. Lord Holland is recounting a

conversation held in 1838 with his friend Godoy, the Prince of the

Peace, in the course of which they appear to have discussed family

matters with that charming ease which excludes considerations of

propriety.

"I asked him if he saw Don Francisco; and his manner of saying 'no'

convinced me that that Prince, who is notoriously his son, had

made no advances to him; for he somewhat earnestly explained that

it did not become him to seek his protection, and enlarged on the

opportunities he had of knowing the Infanta before her marriage at

Rome, and talking of the beauty of her mother, Isabella, Queen of

Naples, _who was in all senses, I believe, the own brother of her

son-in-law Francisco_."

We have certainly no overstrained impression of the moral purity

of the European courts as they existed fifty years ago. We have no

doubt of the existence of intrigues of a very shameful nature, and

even less of a widespread system of venality and corruption; but

we totally demur to the opinion which Lord Holland seems to have

entertained, that such topics constitute the most interesting and most

important points of history. A man who is collecting notes relative

to the leading features of the age in which he has lived, with the

deliberate intention that these shall, at some future period, be given

to the public, might surely be better occupied--more creditably to

himself, and more usefully to his species--in directing his attention

to the great subjects of social progress, intellectual development,

and high unselfish patriotism, than in gleaning at second-hand the

malicious reports of the antechamber, or in chronicling the whispers

of the waiting-room. Lord Holland either would not, or could not,

avail himself of the opportunities which were evidently within his

reach. He has preferred giving us some sketches, not conceived in the

best or most delicate taste, to the composition of a manly picture;

and therefore we cannot be expected to feel any exuberant degree of

gratitude on the receipt of the legacy, or to entertain any very

exalted notion of the artistical acquirements of the painter.

Perhaps it may be thought that we have attached more importance to

this work than it deserves; and certainly, seeing that we have been

compelled to pronounce so unfavourable a judgment on its merits,

there may appear room for the allegation. But it must be remembered

that a book always acquires a certain degree of factitious importance

from the position of its writer. Humble and nameless men may scribble

their Reminiscences by the ream, rush boldly into print, and yet

find scarce a single reader. If their works are indeed destitute of

merit, they can hardly be said to fall into oblivion, for they never

take hold of the memory. They have neither the advantage of a name

to introduce, nor the greater advantage of genius to recommend them.

But the case is different when men of station and title come forward

in the character of authors. They are sure to find an audience, even

though that audience should be deeply disappointed; and if, besides

these other advantages, they are fortunate enough to have any sort of

literary connection, they never want heralds who are ready and able

to proclaim their advent to the world. We regret exceedingly that

we have been compelled to use the language of condemnation rather

than of praise--for the literature of the present century has been

greatly enriched in almost every department by the contributions of

the nobility of England, and we never feel greater pleasure than when

able to bear testimony to such instances of talent and industry. It

becomes, therefore, of more importance that the critical function

should be duly and justly performed; and that no work, which does not

possess a certain degree of intrinsic merit, should be allowed to pass

under shelter of the author's name. Had the merit been there, we should

most gladly have followed the example of our critical brother in the

_Edinburgh Review_; and, adopting his magnificent, sonorous, but not

very intelligible phraseology, have taken care that "the last chords

of our opera should be accompanied by double drums, and the burst of

a brass band, and that our curtain should drop before the gold and

tissue, the waving wings, and the flowing garlands of a modern opera!"

FOOTNOTES:

[19] _Foreign Reminiscences._ By HENRY RICHARD LORD HOLLAND. Edited by

his Son, Henry Edward Lord Holland. Longmans: 1850.

[20] Chapter XCII. Sect. 72.

[21] ALISON, Chapter XCII. Sect. 66.

[22] ALISON, Chapter XCV. Sect. 101.

POPERY IN THE NINETEENTH CENTURY.

The constant custom of the advocates of Popery is to represent their

religion as a work of the primitive age. With them it is a Patriarchal

figure, beginning its pilgrimage by a Divine summons, and protected

by Divine influence; perhaps occasionally touched by the stains, or

sinking under the struggles belonging to all human history, but still

suddenly purifying its robes into more than their original brightness,

and turning its difficulties into the weapons of that warfare which is

to end in the sovereignty of the world.

The learned investigation of Protestantism, however, wholly strips this

Patriarchal figure of its antique habiliments, declares that every

fragment of its ceremonial has been the work of ages when Christianity

had fallen into oblivion; that its belief is credulity, its system an

accumulation of error, and its spirit an antagonism to the gospel.

On the other hand, the Popish stigma on Protestantism is, that it is a

_new_ name, unknown before the sixteenth century. But to this charge

the natural answer has been, that a name is nothing; that Christianity

was once a new name, and that Heathenism was older than Popery.

The true question is of principle, and then the decision is

clear. Popery appeals for its authority to councils and fathers;

Protestantism, to apostles and prophets. The doctrines of Rome are

to be looked for only in the annals of the Popedom; the doctrines of

Protestantism appeal only to the New Testament. "The Bible, and the

Bible alone, is the religion of Protestants," was the maxim of the

celebrated Chillingworth. Nothing commanded by the New Testament can be

rejected by Protestantism, nothing contradictory of the New Testament

can be received by Protestantism. The appeal of Rome is to tradition;

the appeal of Protestantism is to inspiration.

We shall now give the dates, at which the peculiar errors of Popery

were engrafted on the worship of the Roman world.

The claim of the Headship of Christianity was the first of the Romish

errors, and the fount from which they all flowed. But this claim

was first formally made in the sixth century, (A.D., 533,) and was

established by the Emperor Justinian. But no mortal power had the right

to give, or to assume, this title. The headship of the universal church

belongs to Christ alone, who has been made "Head over all things to

His church." No human being could be competent to the high duty of

governing a church spreading, and to be ultimately spread, through all

nations. The government is also _spiritual_, of which no human being

of this earth can have a _comprehension_. Its seizure by the Bishop of

Rome was an enormous usurpation. In about sixty years after, the title

was disclaimed by the Bishop of Rome, in indignation at its seizure by

the Bishop of Constantinople; but it was solicited again, in the reign

of the Emperor Phocas, (A.D., 606,) and has been ever since retained.

It is not to be presumed, that this usurpation was universally allowed.

God has not left Himself without witnesses in any age. Successive

opponents of Rome, preachers of the gospel, the true Protestants,

arose during the dark ages; and a continued resistance to superstition

was sustained for the thousand years of the Popish assumption;

until, in the sixteenth century, the recovery of learning, the

renewed intelligence of the human mind, the translation of the Bible,

and, above all, and acting through all, the mercy of God, restored

Christianity to the world in the glorious German Reformation, (A.D.

1517.)

The most visible practice of Popery is Mass-worship. This practice

commenced early; but we have no direct record of its reception until

the _Second_ Council of NICE, (A.D. 787.)

Infallibility was too monstrous a conception to be adopted, but in the

utter prostration of the general mind. It was, accordingly, first made

an article of faith in the very centre of the Dark Ages, (A.D. 1076.)

But this claim is so repugnant to reason, so contradictory to the

common sense of man, and so palpably overthrown by the vicious conduct

of Popes, and the contemptible quarrels of Councils, that, even among

the Papists, it has been the most dubious of all doctrines--some of

the Popish parties placing infallibility in a General Council, some in

a General Council united with the Pope, some in the Universal Church.

But those disputes, which no human understanding could ever decide,

show only the repugnancy of the doctrine itself to the human intellect.

Infallibility was, at length, by the mere ignorance of knowing where

to place it, quietly delivered into the possession of the Pope. He now

presumed to be the _acting_ infallibility of the Romish world.

Yet, immeasurably absurd as this doctrine is, it is the especial

and favourite one on which the Tractarians insist, and by which the

apostates attempt to justify their guilty desertion to Rome. Infatuated

as they are, they have fixed on the very point where infatuation is

most infatuated, where perversion most degrades the character of the

understanding.

The Celibacy of the Clergy.--After several attempts by ambitious

Popes, this doctrine, or ordinance, was established by the tyrannical

Hildebrand, Gregory the Seventh, in the eleventh century. The parochial

clergy had generally married, and they protested long and strongly

against abandoning their wives. But the advantage of having the

ecclesiastics, in all countries, wholly separated from all connexion

with their native soil and native interests, and the fixture of large

bodies of men in every kingdom, wholly devoted to the objects of the

Popedom, overpowered the voice alike of nature, justice, and scripture.

"Those whom God had joined together" _were_ put asunder by man.

No act, even of the Papacy, ever produced more suffering or more crime.

No act could be politically more injurious, for it withdrew from the

increase of the population--in times when population was the great

want of Europe, and when half the land was desert--300,000 parochial

priests, 300,000 monks and friars, and probably upwards of 300,000

nuns; thus giving to a life of idleness, and almost total uselessness

in a national view, an enormous multitude of human beings annually,

down to this hour, through nearly nine centuries!

But, to give the true character of this presumptuous contempt of the

Divine will, and of the primal blessing of "Increase and multiply,

and replenish the earth," and of the universal custom of the Jewish

covenant, in which the priesthood descended by families; we should

know the solitary miseries entailed by monastic and conventual life,

the thousands of hearts broken by remorse for those rash bonds, the

thousands sunk into idiotism and frenzy by the monotony, the toilsome

trifling, the useless severities, and the habitual tyrannies of the

cloister. Even to those we must add the still darker page of that

grossness of vice which, in the ages previous to the Reformation,

produced frequent remonstrances even from the Popes, and perpetual

disgust among the people.

The Invocation of Saints.--This doctrine first assumed an acknowledged

form in the seventh century. It had been gradually making its way,

since the dangerous homage paid to the tombs of the martyrs in

the third and fourth centuries. But this invocation made them, in

the estimate of their worshippers, gods. For the supposition that

they heard and answered prayer in every part of the world at once,

necessarily implied Omnipresence--an attribute exclusively belonging to

Deity.

Transubstantiation.--This doctrine declares that, when the words of

consecration have been pronounced over the Eucharist, the bread and

wine are _actually_ transformed into the _body and blood_, the _soul

and divinity_ of Christ. This monstrous notion was wholly unknown to

the Christians of the first four centuries. In the eleventh century, it

was held that the body of Christ was actually present, without directly

affirming in what manner. It was not until the thirteenth century (A.D.

1215) that the change of the bread and wine became an acknowledged

doctrine, by the Fourth Lateran Council.

This doctrine contradicts the conception of a miracle, which consists

in a _visible_ supernatural change. It contradicts the physical

conception of body, which is, that body is local, and of course cannot

be in two places at once; but the body of Christ is in Heaven. It also

contradicts Scripture, which pronounces that the taking of the bread

and wine would be wholly profitless, but by the accompanying operation

of the Holy Spirit acting on the faithful partaker of the Sacrament;

the language of Christ being--"The _flesh_ profiteth nothing. The words

that I speak to you, they are spirit." The whole efficacy is spiritual.

The Mass.--Popery declares that in the Mass is offered continually

the _actual sacrifice_ of Christ. This conception arises from

Transubstantiation, by which the Host is Christ; and the priest thus

continually offering the Host is presumed to sacrifice our Lord, in

every instance of the offering!

This doctrine is threefold--that the priest can make God, that flour

and water can be God, and that the wafer, which is still but flour and

water to the senses, is the Christ of whom it is declared in Scripture

that, "having suffered _once for all_ for the sins of men, he sat down

for ever at the right hand of God." This monstrous doctrine was long

disputed, and, though practically adopted, was not confirmed before the

Council of Trent, (A.D. 1563.)

The Half-communion.--This doctrine originated also in

Transubstantiation. From pronouncing the Eucharist to be actually

Christ, scruples arose as to its chances of pollution; and as the wine

might be spilt, it became the custom to give only the bread to the

laity, in whose mouths it is placed by the priest. But a mutilated

sacrament is none. The consequence of this doctrine is, that no Popish

_layman_ ever receives the Eucharist, or has received it during the

last four hundred years!--most awful and terrible result of human

presumption!

Auricular Confession.--By this doctrine, the forgiveness of sin must

be preceded by confession to a priest. In contradiction to the whole

tenor of Scripture, which declares the forgiveness of sin to depend on

sincere prayer for forgiveness, through the atonement of Christ, and on

the determination to sin no more: "Come to _me_ all ye that are heavy

laden, and I will refresh you."--"Repent ye, and be converted, that

your sins may be blotted out."

But Auricular Confession, with its subsequent Absolution, actually

increases crime, by disburthening the mind of remorse, and by

substituting absolution for repentance. This practice was established,

as a portion of the acknowledged system of Rome, scarcely before the

thirteenth century.

Purgatory.--This doctrine was unheard of in the first four centuries.

It crept in about the seventh century, the period of the chief

corruptions of worship. It was not sanctioned by any council until the

fifteenth century, (A.D. 1438.) Its first establishment was by the

Council of Trent.

This doctrine, which is wholly contradictory to the redemption declared

in the Gospel, as resulting from the sufferings of Christ alone;

declares that every sinner must be qualified for redemption in part, by

undergoing sufferings of his own; that he must be personally punished

in Purgatory for his temporal sins, to be purified for Heaven. The

doctrine is evidently borrowed from the Heathen ideas of Tartarus. It

has not the slightest ground in Scripture, and is totally opposed to

the whole spirit and bearing of Christianity.

Indulgences.--This doctrine originated in the combination of Purgatory

and Saintship. It held, that the merits of the dead might be applied

to the wants of the living; and that these merits, not being required

for the redemption of the saints, were preserved in the hands of the

Church, to be distributed as remissions from Penance, in the first

instance, and in the next, from the terms of suffering in Purgatory.

These remissions were sold by Rome under the name of Indulgences, and

were given for any and every period. These Indulgences extended from

a year to ten thousand years. Instances are recorded of their being

extended to thirty thousand years! This was the most lucrative portion

of the traffic of Rome. It brought in prodigious sums to the Roman

Treasury.

Masses for the Dead.--This doctrine was connected with those of

Purgatory and Indulgences. By it a succession of solitary masses might

be continually carried on, either to relieve the Purgatorial torments,

or shorten their duration. But these masses must be paid for either

in money or land. They formed the vast funds which endowed the great

Romish establishments--the monasteries, &c. Operating on the fears

of the dying, the Popish priesthood rapidly possessed themselves of

enormous wealth, and, in England, they were calculated to be masters

of one-third of the land! The statute of mortmain alone preserved

the rest. This prodigious grasp was loosened at the Reformation, and

the monkish institutions were deprived of the wealth gained only by

superstition.

It is obvious how fatally a doctrine of this order must operate on

society. If man could clear himself from the punishment of a life of

profligacy by a bequest on his deathbed, his whole responsibility

would be removed at once. The fear of judgment would be extinguished

throughout his life; he could have no restraint but the arm of society.

Masses would be his substitute for morals; and his conscience would

be cleared by the acts of others, for years after he was laid in the

grave. If Masses could avail, there would be no use in living virtue,

to any man who was able to _pay for them_.

This doctrine, intolerable in the view of common sense, unjust in

placing an insurmountable distinction between the rich and the poor,

and wholly contradictory to the spirit of the gospel--which commands

that "every man shall work out his _own salvation_ with fear and

trembling, for it is God that worketh in him, _both to will and to

do_"--was created and continued for its vast profits to the priesthood

of Rome.

The celebrated Council of Trent, which, under various forms, sat from

1542 till 1563, collected all these doctrines into a _system_, and the

subsequent act of Pius IV. gave them in the shape of a creed to the

Popish world.

We are glad to find that the "Papal Aggression" has awakened the

intelligent and important authority of the English bar. On all great

questions of the liberties and rights of the empire, that authority is

of the most decisive order; and in this spirit we welcome with peculiar

gratification a pamphlet from the well-known and eloquent pen of Mr

Warren.[23] He commences by this bold and manly denunciation of the

Papal interference with the rights of the Church and the privileges of

the crown:--

"The ascendency of the Protestant faith in this country is in

danger, notwithstanding the noble movement which has been made

in its defence. The position so suddenly taken by the mortal

enemy of that faith, is meant to be permanent; and he is silently

intrenching himself in it: regarding all that has been said by

this great nation as "sound and fury, signifying--NOTHING." He

is infinitely more to be feared than he wishes at present to be

believed; and though the precipitancy of priestly ambition may have

deranged, for a moment, the working of his policy, it is really

profound and comprehensive, as its results will in due time show;

and has been accommodated to the political and ecclesiastical

circumstances of the country with malignant exactitude and

skilfulness.

"The political power of the Papacy lies hid under its spiritual

pretensions, like a venomous serpent lurking under lovely foliage

and flowers. A leading object of this Letter, is to explain and

illustrate that truth, in its practical application to the great

question now before the country, challenging its best energies of

thought and will. It would be fatally fallacious to regard the

late act of the Pope as exhibiting only the spasms of weakness.

The more it is considered, the greater cause will be developed

for anxious but resolute action. As a pretender to the exercise

of direct temporal power, the Pope seems quite impotent; but he

is the visible exponent of a spiritual despotism, founded (so we

Protestants believe, or have no right to be such) as clearly on

falsehood and impiety, as its pretensions and purpose are at once

sublime and execrable; that purpose being to extinguish, and in

the name of Heaven, the liberties of mankind.

"The question then--'_The Queen or the Pope?_'--is a momentous

one, which we have been very insolently challenged to answer. The

whole matter, social, political, and religious, is gathered up into

those few words; and posterity will sit in judgment on our mode of

answering that question."

Mr Warren, in taking a lawyer's general view of the subject, strikingly

adverts to the _impudence_ of the Papist assertions. It is true that

these assertions have now shrunk into a very small compass; that

the bravado of "my Lord Cardinal" has dwindled down into a sort of

supplication to be suffered to remain here on any terms; and that the

"prince" has stooped into the pilgrim, gliding through the filth, vice,

and poverty of the Irish colony in Westminster, or, as he terms it, the

_slums_--an expression of extreme vulgarity, which, Mr Warren justly

observes, does not belong to the English language, and which, we may as

justly observe, belongs only to the meanest of the rabble.

But the organs of Popery abroad have not submitted to circumstances

so demurely, and they let out the Popish objects with all the easy

insolence of the foreigner. Thus Count le Maistre, in a work translated

and published in London, says, "What shall we say of Protestantism, and

of those who defend it, _when it will no longer exist_? Let them rather

aid us in making it disappear. In order to re-establish a religion and

a morality in Europe, in order to give to truth the strength which

it requires for the _conquest it meditates_, it is an indispensable

preliminary to _efface_ from the European dictionary that fatal word,

_Protestantism_." _L'Univers_, the journal of Popery in France, has no

hesitation in pronouncing the Protestant faith in England to be totally

undone, and that Popery is only taking its time to make the operation

complete.

The Popish organ here has been equally plain-spoken, and pronounced,

in the most dashing style, the triumph of Rome, and the return of _all

Protestants_ under its yoke, _on pain of damnation_! Who but must be

indignant at this language! But who can henceforth be deceived?

Mr Warren, in reverting to the character and pretensions of the Papacy,

lays it down as a fundamental proposition, that "the Pope's avowed

spiritual power is pregnant with disavowed political power." He, tells

us further, "that we have to tolerate a rival, who condescends to

equality only as an advance to ascendency." He then gives the memorable

Florentine canon of 1439, which the Romish lawyers regard as containing

"the true doctrine of their church," and for the consequences deducible

from which all Papists are answerable. These are its words:--

"Moreover, we define that the Holy Apostolic See, and the Roman

Pontiff, have a primacy _over the whole world_!--and that the Roman

Pontiff is the successor of St Peter, the chief of the apostles, and

true Vicar of Christ!--and that he is 'head of the whole church,' and

the father and teacher of all Christians!--and to him, in St Peter,

was delegated by our Lord Jesus Christ full power to _feed, rule, and

govern_ the universal church, as also is contained in the Acts of

General Councils, and in the holy canons!" In this daring proclamation

of power, we have the assumption of an authority obviously incompatible

with the peace of any nation under heaven, and equally incompatible

with the common liberties of mankind--for there can be no liberty where

the arbitrary will of a stranger is the fountain of the law, and most

especially contradictory to that Scripture which declares that Christ's

kingdom is _not_ a kingdom after the fashion of this world. When the

question was contemptuously put by Pilate to our Lord himself, "Art

_thou_ a king?" the answer was, that he was not a king in the sense of

the Roman; that, if he were such, "his servants would fight"--in other

words, that he would have the troops and attendance of an earthly king,

that he would have resisted and made war. "But now is my kingdom _not_

of this world."

But what is the Papacy, with its princes and pageantries, its armies

and intrigues, its cabinets and alliances? In what does all this

complicated and systematic mixture in the affairs of the world differ

from the kingdoms of this world? except perhaps in its deeper intrigue,

in its more perpetual artifice, in its more insatiable craving for

power, and in its more habitual gratification of every daring and

dangerous passion of man.

And it has felt the consequences. Of all the kingdoms of this world,

since the fall of Rome, the Popedom has been the _most_ marked by

calamity. There has been no nation whose sovereign has been so _often_

flung from his throne; whose throne has been so often contested with

bloody dissension, whose sovereign has been so often a prisoner in

foreign lands, whose capital has been so often sacked, whose provinces

have been so often in foreign possession, whose population is so

miserable, and whose _vassalage_ has been so palpable, so humiliating,

and so wretched.

But need we look to the past, when we see the Papacy at this hour? Need

we dig up ancient fields of battle, to see how often its armies have

been buried; or dive into its dungeons, to see how many centuries of

fetters are recorded there against its presumption? Need we break up

its tombs to see its shattered crosiers and tarnished tiaras, when we

see the living figure that sits in mock majesty in the Vatican, with a

_French_ garrison in the Castle of St Angelo?

But the Papist demands religious liberty. The words, in Papist lips,

are jargon. He has never had it in any country on earth. Has he it in

Rome? Can the man have the absurdity to call himself a freeman, when

the priest may tear the Bible out of his hand; when, without a license,

he cannot look into the Book of Life?--when, with or without a license,

he cannot exercise his own understanding upon its sacred truths, but

must refuse even to think, except as the priest commands?--when, for

daring to have an opinion on the most essential of all things--his own

salvation--he is branded as a heretic; and when, for uttering that

opinion, he is cast into the dungeon?--when the priest, with the _Index

Expurgatorius_ in his hand, may walk into his house, and strip it of

every book displeasing to the caprices, insolence, and ignorance of a

_coterie_ of monks in the Vatican?

If the legitimate and noble boast of the Englishman is, that his

house is his castle, what is the house of the Italian Papist, but

his dungeon? If the Irish or the English Papist demands "Religious

Liberty," let him demand it of his master the Pope. If the Papist

_desires_ it, let him break the Popish fetter, and emancipate himself.

Till then, we must look upon his claim as lawlessness instead of

liberty, and hypocrisy instead of religion.

But, before the Papist requires more than toleration, must he not

show that at least he _tolerates_? If, in the Popish kingdoms of the

Continent, fear or policy has produced some degree of Protestant

toleration, what is the condition of Protestantism in the capital of

Popery; and, in its most important point, freedom of worship? To this

day, no English Protestant is suffered to worship within the walls of

Rome.

The Americans, with a sense of national right, of which it is a scandal

to England not to have adopted the example, have insisted on having a

chapel--a solitary chapel!--in Rome; while the English have been forced

to run from one _lodging_ to another, to hide in holes and corners, and

to exhibit to the Roman rabble the sight of Protestants sneaking to a

worship indebted only to connivance for its being suffered to exist at

all! From 1815, the year in which _we_ gave liberty to the Pope, their

worship was held only in _private rooms_ for the ten following years,

even to which the English were prohibited from going in carriages. They

must go on foot! From 1826, the condition of their worship is thus

stated on the authority of the chaplain:--

"In that year, the English congregation migrated to a _granary_ outside

the Flaminian Gate. In the upper part of this huge building, a space,

large enough for a congregation, was hired. It was reduced into shape

by lath and plaster; it had a ceiling of canvass to hide the rafters

and cobwebs, and carpets laid over straw, for covering the mud floor.

The rats and mice ran races over the canvass above the heads of the

worshippers; the pigs, in great numbers, squealed in concert in the

story below; and sometimes the donkeys, laden with sacks of corn,

disputed the common staircase with the congregation. On one occasion,

the competition was more serious. The first story of the building was

hired for a _menagerie_, and on a Sunday morning we found the wild

beasts in previous possession."

Can any vulgar display of intolerance exceed this humiliation? There

is not a beggar in Rome who does not stand on tiptoe, at the sight of

the English going to their _barn_. There is not a saucy priest, who

does not turn up his nostrils at the sight. And yet the population

live on the English expenditure. If the English were to leave Rome for

a twelvemonth, half their population--a population of lodging-letters

and valets--would starve. We certainly can feel no compassion for

any degree of contempt which can be heaped on the English residents,

who desert their own noble country for the coffee-house life of the

Continent. The men who can abandon their duties to England (and what

man is not without his duty?) for cheap wine, gossip, and grimace--the

race of sullen selfishness and perpetual vacuity--are justly punished

by foreign ill-usage. But still, the insult is to the religion of

England, and it teaches us the real feeling of Popery in power. Let

the Protestant ever suffer the predominance of Rome in England, and

he will then only know what Popish power is in its nature, its fierce

recollections, and its grasping ambition. In the mean time, let him

look at the Protestants creeping through the "Flaminian Gate" to their

_Barn_, outside the walls of Rome!

What right can those have, who so loudly proclaim themselves the

spiritual subjects of the Papacy, to demand here what they refuse

there? Are they to insist on privileges, where their condescension

only amounts to pigsties? What would become of their levees and

lectures here, if we laid them under the Roman rule, which sends

"controversialists to jail?" Is it not the fact, that no Protestant

can be buried within the walls of Rome; and that no inscription can

be placed on a Protestant grave, without being subjected to the Roman

Censor; who scratches his pen over every syllable referring to the hope

of a _Resurrection_?

Those statements have been repeated in every public journal of the

empire. Who has contradicted them? Have we not, then, a right to demand

the liberty which we give? or, if refused by the dwarfed and beggarly

sovereignty of Rome, ought we not to act with the insulted dignity of

the first kingdom and truest religion of the world?

The great error of Protestants, in their legislation on Popish

questions, is, to believe that the same rules of morality exist in

the Church of England and in Popery. The pamphlet applies itself with

full effect to the facts of the case, by giving the Papist _oath_, and

contrasting it with the Papist performance.

"The essential items of the Papist oath of 1829 were--'I do not

believe that the Pope of Rome hath, or ought to have, any temporal or

civil jurisdiction, power, superiority, or pre-eminence, directly or

indirectly, within this realm. I disclaim, disavow, and solemnly abjure

_any intention to subvert the present Church Establishment_, as settled

by law within this realm; and I solemnly swear, that _I never will

exercise any privilege_, to which I am or may be entitled, to _disturb_

or _weaken_ the Protestant religion or Protestant government in the

United Kingdom.'"

What must be the contempt felt for all Popish promises, when we see

this _oath_, and see the conduct of the Popish body _ever since_ it

was taken! "With what feelings," says Mr Warren, "any one who has

taken this oath, can peruse and approve of the Bull of Pius IX. and

the Pastoral of his pseudo-cardinal archbishop, and contemplate with

satisfaction what has been recently done by him and others in professed

conformity with that Bull, I am perfectly at a loss to conceive."

And in this honest difficulty of conception every true Protestant

will coincide with him. But let us look to the natural result of this

palpable callousness of conscience.

The sacredness of oaths is essential to the _existence_ of society:

the man who is not to be believed on his oath is self-banished,

self-disfranchised, self-excluded from all the rights of society;

for the obvious reason, that, if all men were equally false, society

_must_ dissolve. Such a man is no longer entitled to the protection

of law. And the same rule is inevitably applicable to any institution

which thus sets itself at war with society. Popery is _anti-social_.

This sentiment is the substance of a letter by the late Bishop Watson;

a man of a rough and almost republican spirit--a bold advocate for

liberality, almost to the verge of Liberalism--and, though a vigorous

arguer against Paine and his infidelity, yet as sturdy a disclaimer of

all submission to prejudice as any radical orator of our day. We quote

the pamphlet.

In a letter to the Duke of Rutland, in 1784, the Bishop says--"I

particularly agree with you in relation to the (Roman) Catholics. No

man on earth, I trust, can have more enlarged sentiments of toleration

than I have. But the Church of Rome is a _persecuting_ Church; and it

is our interest and _our duty_, on every principle of _religion and

common sense_, to guard ourselves against her machinations." He then

gives the expression of the great Lord Clarendon--"It is the _duty_

of Catholic subjects in a Protestant country, of priests as well as

the laity, to abjure the Pope's supremacy, _ecclesiastical_ as well as

temporal."

The Popish advocates lay great weight on the patronage afforded to

their parliamentary demands by the Cabinet of Pitt; who evidently

made the grand mistake of supposing that spiritual dominion could be

disunited from temporal--a mistake as great as supposing that the

command of the limbs could be disunited from the power of the mind. But

the views of the Minister were founded merely on political objects,

while the true question was one of religion. The argument is thus

summarily answered:--

"Let me remind you that an illustrious statesman, William Pitt, in the

very last speech which he delivered in Parliament, expressed himself on

the subject of Roman Catholic emancipation in the following remarkable

language:--'I never thought that it would have been wise to throw down

rudely the guards and fences of the Constitution. But I did think,

that if the system I alluded to had been adopted, it _ought_ to have

been accompanied by those checks and guards, and with every regulation

which could have given respect and influence to the Established Church,

to the support and protection of the Protestant interest, and to the

encouragement of every measure which could tend to propagate the

example of the _Protestant religion_.'

"His splendid pupil, Canning, the most ardent friend of Roman Catholic

emancipation, also thus expressed himself: 'Go as far as you can, _with

safety_ to the Establishment. Do not exact from them terms that are

unnecessary, but be rigorous in imposing such conditions as shall free

you from all real, I had almost said all imaginary, danger.'"

These are important opinions, which should teach us _how_ to act. We

have seen those guards and fences broken down; we have seen every

protective condition _accepted_, and finally scoffed at, and we are at

this moment at once insulted and injured by the cool and contemptuous

violation of every promise which was required for the safety of the

Church--of Protestantism.

But the whole system of concession was founded on ignorance, carried

on by faction, and suffered by infatuation. That unhappy concession is

the only blot on the tomb of Pitt, who made it in ignorance: it is the

chief among the many blots on the tomb of Canning, who made faction his

auxiliary, by first sacrificing his Toryism; and it covers with the

indelible contempt, due to the traffic of principle, the whole paltry

and perfidious generation who, subsequently, under different garbs, but

with the same physiognomy of worldliness, have droned and drivelled and

died off in the shadow of the Treasury. What the majority of those men

thought, is a subject too low for memory; what they did, is to be seen

in the scars of the Constitution.

But when the mighty orb of Pitt undergoes an eclipse, it must be by a

body of no slight magnitude. His wisdom was actually thwarted by his

magnanimity. Himself the soul of honour, he evidently imagined that

Popery was capable of honour.

"What would William Pitt, what would George Canning, say?" exclaims

Mr Warren, "were they still alive to read the Bull of Pius IX. and Dr

Wiseman's Pastoral? and _what would they do_?"

We think that we can answer the question. If Pitt denounced the

grasping ambition of French republicanism, if Canning lashed the low

absurdities of Radicalism, with what indignant justice would they

not have stript and scourged an aggression which unites more than

the ambition of the one, with more than the absurdity of the other!

With what lofty vengeance would Pitt have trampled down the haughty

usurpation which dared to degrade England into a _province_! and with

what sarcastic ridicule would Canning have stung the bloated arrogance

with which, from a palace almost a _prison_, an impudent monk dared to

control the liberties of England!

But what would the Papal assumptions be, if uttered by any other

sovereign? Let us suppose that Austria ventured to send a dozen of

her monks here to carve the land into dioceses. What would be the

universal exclamation, but that Austria was _mad_; and that the first

monk who made the attempt should find his only diocese within the

walls of Newgate. What if France declared England a _province_? Can we

doubt that our answer would be a declaration of war? And is a beggarly

Italian--a fugitive from his own territory, a priest flying for his

life in the livery of a footman--to offer this insult with impunity?

But if we are told that Pius IX. is a different personage from his

predecessors, a _Liberal_, a man of the new school--tempted, by

misrepresentations from his emissary monks here, to make a usurpation

against his nature--let us hear the pamphlet:--

"Let us go to the fountain-head. Pope Pius IX., who, on his elevation

to the supreme Episcopate, addressed an elaborate Encyclical Letter

to 'all patriarchs, primates, archbishops, and bishops,' dated 9th of

November 1846, and which, to the eyes of any person in whom exists a

single spark of true protestant Christianity, appears surcharged with

blasphemous presumption, falsehood, and bigotry."

In this document, the Pope solemnly and formally asserts his _claim_

to be the Vicar of Christ on earth! declares that God has constituted

the Pope a _living authority_ to teach the true sense of his Heavenly

revelations, and to judge _infallibly_ (infallibili judicia) in all

controversies on faith and morals, and that "_out of the Catholic

Church there is no salvation_;" and he bitterly denounces our "most

crafty Bible societies," (a denunciation simply against the Bible

itself, for there are no _notes_ of any kind in the Bibles thus

published.)

In this letter, "the Pope will be found, in the year 1846, to use the

essential terms of the Florentine Canon, which has been in force for

four hundred and eleven years, and under whose sanction, consequently,

have been perpetrated, by the Papal authority, all the enormous crimes

and offences which history records against it during that long period."

Mr Warren then quotes, as illustrative of the Pope's assumed supremacy

in _temporals_ over the Papist everywhere, a conversation detailed

in evidence before a Committee of the House of Commons.--'I said

to him, (a respectable Roman Catholic,) suppose the Pope and his

Council announced that the King of England was a person who should

be deposed--would you feel in conscience bound, as a Roman Catholic,

to obey?' He answered, 'Certainly not, because it would be contrary

to Scripture.' I asked whether _he_ or his church was to judge of

Scripture? He replied, 'His church.' I then asked, 'If the decree was

so worded, that the Pope and Council affirmed it to be _not_ contrary,

but according to Scripture, that a heretical monarch should be deposed,

how would you act?' He admitted, 'that he should feel himself _bound by

the decree_, because it was _for the Pope to judge of Scripture_, and

that, as a Roman Catholic, he should _obey him_.'

In this conversation we have a perfect specimen of Popish casuistry.

The man is suffered to believe that he has a _conscience_, and that he

is ever obedient to _Scripture_. But Popery still holds him fast, and

if regicide should suit its purposes, he can _give the blow_ with a

safe conscience. What must be the religion when such is the morality?

And this view leads us to the true question on which the whole

subject turns. In the eyes of the Tractarians, the controversy is

simply between an _old_ church and a _new_. In the apologies of the

apostates, it is simply between Papal infallibility and private

judgment. Thus, the whole is diluted into a mere metaphysical inquiry,

while both suppress the entire practical _reality_ of this tremendous

superstition. In those tranquil subtleties and meek submissions they

both labour to conceal the _fact_, that if they are to be Papists, they

_must_ be _worshippers_ of the Virgin Mary; they must be worshippers

of imaginary saints; they must be worshippers of stocks and stones,

as the images of those imaginary saints; and they must be prepared to

do the bidding of the Papacy, even though that should amount to the

dissolution of society; for to this they _must_ come. This is _their_

yoke. To this every man who apostatises is bound for life: he must drag

the whole length of the chain.

Strong curiosity is now excited by the approach of Parliament; and

the inquiry into the measures contemplated by the Cabinet is intense.

In the midst of the numberless conjectures hazarded at the moment, a

letter from the Bishop of Durham to a body of his clergy has appeared;

which, when we remember that the memorable letter of the Premier was

addressed to the Bishop, and that a correspondence on the subject

may have been continued, seems to throw a light on the Ministerial

intentions, and probably has been written for the _express purpose_.

The Bishop, after observing that the question of religious liberty

to the Roman Catholics could not possibly require "that a foreign

potentate should be permitted to insult a great nation, trample on the

rights of a sovereign secured by law, and disturb the peace and good

order of the Established Church," proceeds to state his conception of

the _necessary_ measures of protection.

"In order to prevent such evils, it may be necessary to provide--

"Some restrictions upon the _introduction_ and _circulation_ of _Papal

Bulls_ in this island.

"To prohibit the _assumption of Episcopal titles_ conferred by Rome,

and deriving the name from _any place in_ this country.

"It may also be desirable to forbid the _existence of monastic

institutions_, strictly so called.

"Nor can the residence of any _Jesuits_ appear otherwise than injurious

among Scotch and English Protestants. This Order is well known to have

shown itself so dangerous, that it was suppressed by Clement XIV.,

1773, with the approbation of all wise and good men. What species or

amount of merit may have brought them again into favour with Rome, I

profess myself unable to determine. But I am sure you will agree with

me that a body of men, whose principles and conduct have been so justly

reprobated in (Roman) Catholic countries, cannot be looked upon as

desirable neighbours among Protestants like ourselves.

"To some such measures as I have thus pointed out, it may in all

probability _be found necessary to resort_; and they may not improperly

be _referred to in petitions_ presented to Parliament in the ensuing

Session."

Of course it would be essential that, in the exclusion of Bulls, all

documents asserting any similar authority over the Popish subjects

of the realm, as "Apostolical Letters," "Rescript Ordinances," and,

in short, every paper claiming a public right by the Pope to govern

the Papists in England or Ireland, and in any portion of the British

empire, should be distinctly comprehended. We must not suffer ourselves

to be cheated by names. Similarly, it will not be enough to put down

convents and monasteries, so called, but _every_ institution in which

Popish vows are taken, binding the rash and unfortunate people who take

them, for life. Here, too, we must not be cheated by names. Similarly,

we must put down not merely Jesuits, so called, but every Order of

foreign monk-ism, let it hide itself under what name it will. Rome is

all _artifice_, and we may be well assured that, whether under the

name of Oratorians, or Preachers, or Brethren of the Spirit, the craft

of Jesuitry will be exercised to make its way into England, and keep

its footing here.

The Bishop's letter makes no direct reference to Ireland. But in

Ireland there are _two millions_ of Protestants; and if Protestantism

is to be triumphant in England, it _must_ be protected in Ireland.

As to the right, the justice, and the necessity of those measures,

and many more of the same kind, there can be no doubt on the mind

of any rational being. Lords Beaumont, Norfolk, and Camoys, Roman

Catholics, have openly stated that the operation of the Papal Bull,

is _incompatible_ with temporal allegiance to the Queen. The pamphlet

from which we have quoted so largely, from a sense of its merits,

disposes of the question in reference to the British Constitution; and

the united feeling of the nation, which has already, in the purest

spirit of _Christian_ men, exclaimed "NO POPERY," must now, in the most

determined spirit of _Freemen_, exclaim, "NO SURRENDER!"

_Printed by William Blackwood and Sons, Edinburgh._

FOOTNOTES:

[23] _The Queen or the Pope? The Question considered in its Political,

Legal, and Religious Aspects._ By SAMUEL WARREN, Esq., Barrister-at-law.

Transcriber's Notes:

Pp. 222 & 234 supplied anchors for unanchored footnotes.

Simple spelling, grammar, and typographical errors were corrected.

Punctuation normalized.

Anachronistic and non-standard spellings retained as printed.

Italics markup is enclosed in _underscores_.