bear in mind, that Llorenti is good authority with all Roman
Catholics,--relates the following fact. There was among the Carmelite
nuns of Lerma, a mother abbess, called mother Agueda. (All the nunneries
in the United States have a mother abbess, like the nuns of Lerma.)
Agueda was accounted a saint. People came to her, from all the
neighboring country, to be cured of their respective diseases. Her mode
of curing all diseases was this. She had in her possession a number of
small stones, of which she said she was delivered, in all the pains of
childbirth. She was delivered of them periodically, for the space of
twenty years, according to her own statement and that of her biographer,
and by the application of those stones to any diseased person, he was
forthwith cured. Rumor, however, got abroad that the _mother abbess_
"was no better than she ought to be," and that, in place of bringing
forth stones, she and the other nuns of the convent were bringing forth
children for the friars of the Carmelite order, who arranged all her
miracles for her, and enabled her for twenty-years to impose upon
the public, as the lady prioress of a nunnery and fashionable
boarding-school. Whenever she was _confined_ and delivered of a child,
the _holy nuns_ strangled it and buried it. All the other nuns did
likewise, and probably would have continued to do so to this day,
through their successors in office, had not a niece of the mother abbess
and _saint_, in a moment of anger, arising from maltreatment, let
fall some observations which excited the suspicions of the public
authorities. The burying-ground of the nuns was examined, the spot where
the strangled infants were buried was pointed out by the niece of the
mother abbess, and the bodies found.
This fact is as well authenticated, as that such a place as Lerma has
had existence, or that such a wretch as Mother Agueda has ever been
born; and I will hazard the assertion, that if the burying-grounds of
the nunneries in the United States were dug open, hundreds of the bodies
of strangled infants, the offspring of nuns and Popish priests, may
be found in them, though it is said they have discovered some chemical
process, by which the bones, as well as the flesh of infants, are
reduced, in a little time, almost to perfect annihilation.
Virtuous ladies, into whose hands this book by chance may fall, will
exclaim, on reading the above, This cannot be true. I will not believe
it. Such a thing is impossible. If even nuns had witnessed such things,
however depraved they may be, they would fly from such scenes; or at all
events, no _nun_, who has ever been once guilty of such crimes, would
commit them a second time.--Here, again, we see how little Americans
know of Popery, and of the practices of its priests and nuns.
The fact is, Roman Catholic laymen know almost as little of Popery as
Protestants. They are not aware, that, when a female goes to confession,
she virtually binds herself to answer every question which her confessor
proposes, and that the concealment of any thought or deed, which she
committed, was a _mortal sin_, sufficient of itself to consign her soul
to hell. She believes that the priest sits in the confessional, not as
man, but as God. Attend, fellow-citizens, to what I here state to you,
and you will easily conceive the possibility, nay, even the probability,
nay, even further, the truth of every word I relate to you in relation
to the crimes of nuns and priests, within the walls of nunneries.
The woman who goes to confession to a priest, whether a nun or a
lay-sister, whether married or single, believes, that while in the
_sacred tribunal_ of the confessional, he is divested of his humanity,
and acts, not as man, but as God. Nothing, then, is easier, if he
has the least fancy for the penitent, than to persuade her that he is
_divinely_ commissioned to--------. She does not doubt this, and yields
to his wishes. There have been instances,--and there are now thousands
of them in Europe, and even in this country,--where a priest tells every
good-looking woman who goes to confession to him, that it is her duty
to have children by him! Be not startled, American husbands. I make
not these statements to hurt or outrage your feelings. I make it in
compassion for you, and to prevent you, if possible from permitting
your wives or your daughters to go in future to these dens of vice,
called _confessionals_.
I can easily fancy one of you saying to your neighbor, who is also
a Roman Catholic, and whose wife, as well as yours, goes to
confession,--"Well, Mr. A., I care not what may be said against _our_
priest, or against _auricular confession_. My wife goes regularly to
confession, and if she heard or saw anything bad on the part of the
priests, I should soon know it. I have no doubt of it, says Mr. B.
My wife goes also, and so does my daughter, and I suppose nobody will
pretend to say that a priest could do anything wrong to _them_. _They_
know better than to be imposed upon. There is no better woman in the
world than _my_ wife; come over and dine with me. My wife just told me
that she asked the priest to dine with us, and you must come." I can
not only fancy this, but I have seen such meetings. I have seen husbands
unsuspiciously and hospitably entertaining the very priest who seduced
their wives in the confessional, and was the parent of some of the
children who sat at the same table with them, each of the wives
unconscious of the other's guilt, and the husbands of both, not even
suspecting them. The husband of her who goes to confession has no hold
upon her affections. If he claims a right to her confidence, he claims
what he can never receive; he claims what she has not to give. She has
long since given it to her confessor, and he can never recover it. She
looks to her confessor for advice in everything. She may appear to be
fond of her husband; it is even possible that she may be so in reality.
She may be gentle, meek, and obedient to her husband,--her confessor
will advise her to be so; but she will not give him her confidence; she
cannot,--that is already in the hands of her confessor. He stands an
incarnate fiend between man and wife, mother and daughter. All the
ties of domestic happiness and reciprocal duties are thus violated with
impunity through the instrumentality of _auricular confession_.
Would to God I had never entered that _tribunal_ myself! Would to God it
was never in my power to relate as facts what I have now put to paper!
But no such happiness was intended for me! It was the will of Providence
that I was reserved to witness and relate those deeds of darkness
and crime committed under the mask of Popish religion, from which my
feelings and disposition shrink with horror. Voltaire, Rousseau, Raynal,
Price, Priestley, Paine, Diderot, and others, have done evil by
their infidel writings. Evils, great and heavy evils, have been the
consequence of their introduction into the United States; but ten-fold
greater have been the evils which the introduction of Popery and
auricular confession amongst us have brought in their train.
The writings of these infidels have in them, it is true, many of the
most exceptionable passages, but, as far as we know, their private lives
were generally good. Even in their writings, there was much that was
good. They advocated the cause of civil liberty; they pleaded, and
pleaded strongly and eloquently, the cause of human rights, and the
liberties of man. These were redeeming qualities. These were noble
doctrines, and nobly pleaded. But what has Popery brought amongst
us? What have Popish priests introduced into this country? Idolatry,
debauchery in every shape, and of every hue. Yet Americans will cast
into the fire the works of those infidels,--they will not allow their
children to read them, lest they may corrupt their morals, though the
authors are cold in their graves. But they will send them to Popish
schools,--they will allow them to drink lessons of depravity from the
eyes of licentious nuns, and hear them from the lips of Popish priests.
Strange inconsistency, this! Infidels in theory are shunned as plagues,
while practical infidels are cherished amongst us. It is well known to
Protestants even in the United States, that it is a common practice of
Romish priests to seduce females in the _confessional_, and it is,
or should be equally well known that these very priests hear the
confessions of the very females whom they seduce. It is an article of
faith in the Roman Catholic church, that the crimes of a priest do not
disqualify him from _forgiving the sins of his penitent_, and hence it
is that their opportunities of demoralizing every community, where they
are in the ascendant, almost exceed conception. Persuade a woman that if
she sins, you can forgive her as thoroughly and effectually as Almighty
God could forgive her, and you take away every check from vice. All
restraint is removed. The voice of true religion is silenced, and sin
prevails.
The iniquity of Romish priests in the confessional can scarcely be
imagined. There is nothing else like it; it is a thing by itself; there
is a chasm between itself and other crimes, which human depravity cannot
pass. Could I state them all, as I have known them, my readers would
feel themselves almost insulated; an ocean and a sea of wonders, and
waters of grief and sadness for fallen humanity would ebb and flow
around them. Just fancy an innocent female on her knees before an
artful, unbelieving priest! But why is she there? Why does not instinct
warn her off? Why does not conscious innocence tell her to fly from him?
How often do we thank God that we are endowed with reason? How often
do we sing his praises, and glorify his name, because he has "made us a
little lower than the angels," giving us reason for our guide, and thus
raising us above all things that are created? Would it not appear as if
things were not so; as if the God of heaven were more bountiful to the
beasts of the field, and the birds of the air, than to man? Would it not
appear that the poet was mistaken, when he said, in the fulness of his
heart, and depth of his belief in revelation,!!!!!
"And to be innocent is nature's wisdom; The fledge-dove knows the
prowlers of the air, Feared soon as seen, and flatters back to shelter;
And the young steed recoils upon his haunches The never-yet-seen adder's
hiss first heard. O surer than suspicion's hundred eyes Is that fine
sense, which, to the pure in heart, By mere oppugnancy of their own
goodness. Reveals the approach of evil."
Would it not seem from this that the gift of reason was no bounty in
reality to man? as if instinct was something superior to it? Why does
not innocence,--native, conscious innocence,--if, in reality, there is
such a thing,--teach woman to flee from those incarnate demons, Romish
confessors? Why will they entrust themselves, alone and unprotected
by father or mother, brother or honorable lover, with these scheming,
artful seducers? Why will mothers, married women, go to confession to
these men, or why will husbands be such inconceivable dupes as to permit
it? Have husbands any idea of the questions which a confessor puts to
their wives? They have not even the remotest. Let me give them a few
of these questions, and I assure them, as I have more than once done
before, that I state nothing but what I know of my own knowledge. The
following are a few of them. 1st. Have you been guilty of adultery or
fornication, and how often? 2d. Have you desired to commit either, and
how often? 3d. Have you ever intended to commit fornication or adultery?
4th. Have you ever taken pleasure in thinking upon these subjects? 5th.
Have you dwelt upon them for any length of time? 6th. Have you ever
endeavored to excite your own passions? 7th. Have you ever taken
indecent liberties with yourself, or with your husband?
Does any husband really know that when his wife goes to confession,--and
probably she leans on his arm while she is going there,--that the above
questions are put to her? Assuredly, he does not. Otherwise, we must
suppose him a man of base principles in permitting such a thing. But
even should he suspect it, and ask his wife whether they were put to
her; should he call upon the priest, and bring him and the wife face to
face; should he ask them severally whether such interrogatories were put
by the priest to the wife, they will jointly and severally deny it under
oath, if required, and in doing this, they both feel justified; or, to
speak more correctly and plainly, the priest is laughing in his sleeve,
and the wife is his dupe. The reason, however, for the course they
pursue, is this. The _infallible_ church teaches, that when a priest is
in the confessional, he sits there as God, and not as man; and when he
denies under oath that he put such questions, he means that he did not
put the questions as man, but as God; and when the penitent is asked
whether such questions were put to her, she will say on _oath_ they were
not, because it was God, and not man, that asked them. I am well aware
that this will appear strange to Americans, but it is not the less true.
I have asked such questions, and given such reasons over and over
again, while acting as a Romish priest. I have asked them, till my
soul sickened with disgust. Every priest in Boston asks those questions
daily; there is not a priest in the United States who does not
ask them. No, not one,--from Aroostook to Oregon, nor from Maine to
Louisiana. Judge, then, of the moral waste and wilderness which Romish
priests are effecting by hewing and clearing down everything that blooms
or bears the fruit of virtue and holiness.
But can such things exist in a civilized country? It is all the result
of education,--of bad, vicious, and corrupt education. Let us suppose
that a married man has a neighbor whom he believes to be honorable
upright, and correct in all his dealings, so much so, that he never had
occasion to doubt his word, and would trust him with thousands, nay,
millions if he had it. Suppose his wife had the reputation of a good and
virtuous woman. Suppose she was considered so by the pious members of
her own and every other church in this city. Suppose this individual, to
whom I have alluded, should discover that his wife was in the habit of
meeting his neighbor very frequently in some retired nook or corner, and
holding long and confidential conversation with him,--think you he would
not suspect something wrong? Suppose he were to ask his wife what they
were talking about, and she should say that he was giving her spiritual
counsel,--think you that this would be satisfactory to him? Would he
permit those interviews to continue? Surely not. But why distrust the
well-known prudence of his wife, and the honor of a man he has known for
years? Is it wise in him to suspect a worthy man? It is not only wise,
but it is proper. It would even be criminal not to do so. The man who
would not forbid these interviews, would be considered a low-spirited
wretch, unworthy the society of all honorable men. He would sink even
in his own estimation; and how comes it, then, that this very man, so
sensitive, so distrustful of the virtue of an honorable neighbor,
will permit the same wife to hold _private_ meetings, and _private_
conversations in confessionals and in private rooms, with Romish
priests,--strangers, some of them, and foreigners,--notorious for the
profligacies of the orders of monks and Jesuits to which they belong,
and the countries from which they came. This, I will frankly confess, is
a paradox, which my limited powers of ratiocination do not enable me
to solve. I will not say that some of those married ladies, who go to
confession, are not virtuous women, but I will unhesitatingly say,
that many of them have been ruined in the confessional, that they run
a fearful risk in going there at all, and as it is truly said, "he that
loves the danger, shall perish therein."
Let not married men, or married women, who belong to the Roman Catholic
church, suppose that I mean to be disrespectful to them in what I have
said or what I may say hereafter. The reverse is the fact To them I have
no personal enmity, but I have for them the most sincere compassion. I
would rescue them, if I could, from those wolves in sheep's clothing,
Romish priests. It is my duty to do so as their fellow-citizen, and it
is peculiarly incumbent on me to do so, as I feel that I am the only
man in the United States, whose personal knowledge of facts fits him
for such a task, and whose peculiar circumstances enable him to do so
without bias or prejudice. I am aware they will raise a fresh hue and
cry against me; Popish priests and bishops will give tongue, and the
whole Romish pack, young and old, married and single, widows and maids,
will follow in full chorus. They can do no more than they have done.
There is scarcely a law of this land which they have not accused me
of violating, ever since I presumed to say that the Bible should be
circulated among the poor Roman Catholics, and that the holy mother
church was not infallible. The accusations against Luther, Zuingle and
Calvin, were not greater or much more numerous, than those which Papists
have brought against me, month after month, and year after year, ever
since I left them. They have indicted me for assault and battery, for
disturbing public worship, by which they meant the crime of worshiping
God otherwise than the Pope directed. They have indicted me for
rape--keep your countenance, reader--those chaste, moral priests of
the Romish church have indicted me for rape. Is not that a high idea,
Americans?--scarcely anything equal to it to be found in antiquity,
except, perhaps it may be in the conduct of Claudius, the Roman
emperor, who, like the priests of the Romish church, had a very _great
abhorrence_ of everything that was in the least degree unchaste.
Claudius, as the reader must know, succeeded the emperor Caligula, and
that notorious wag, though elegant poet and satirist, Juvenal, tells us
that he was much in the habit of accusing his subjects of the crime of
adultery. "Claudius accusat macchos," says Juvenal; whether he spoke
ironically or not, those who know the life of Claudius as well as I do
the lives of Romish priests, can tell best. But this is not all. They
have accused me of robberies, sending and receiving challenges to fight
duels, having two wives--I know not but more--at the same time. In all
cases, true bills of indictment have been found; Papists appeared
before the grand juries in all cases, and swore like true sons of the
_infallible church_, and as long as they had no one to contradict them,
the holy church triumphed. In this country, however, there happens, as
yet, to be no inquisition, and there are several who doubt not only the
infallibility of the Romish church, but even the impeccability of
some of her beloved children; and hence it happened that all their
indictments evaporated into thin air. These Protestant Americans,
"cowards," as Papists call them, "and _sons of cowards and pirates_"
have no faith in the infallible church, and doubted the veracity of her
pious children, even upon oath The consequence was that I am left to
write the history of my venerable but guilty mother, the infallible
church, and am not without hope that I shall lead her back to the paths
of virtue, from which, in very wantonness of crime, idolatry, brutality
and wickedness she has long since departed.
It would be really amusing to see a correct list of the various
accusations which Papists have made against me, with the various names
and legal titles which they bore. The infallible church alone could
properly classify them. There is euphony in the very sound of them;
there is a variety, nothing short of oriental, in them. But to be
serious; I never did, nor do I now, fear the persecution of Papists,
while in the discharge of a duty which I owe to my Maker and Preserver.
I could always say with sincerity and with humble gratitude, and I can
say so now:!!!!!
"Let then, earth, sea and sky
Make war against me! On my heart I show
Their mighty Master's seal. In vain they try
To end my life, that can but end its woe.
Is that a death-bed where a Christian dies?
Yes! but not his--'t is death itself there dies."
But to return to the subject from which I have digressed, without even
the formality of taking leave of my reader; married ladies, who are
members of the Roman Catholic church, will bear with me a little longer,
I cannot consent to leave them without farther warning; and should their
husbands and myself ever meet--which probably cannot be, till we meet
in heaven--they will thank, in place of blaming me, for cautioning them
against the seductive wiles and wicked intrigues of Romish confessors.
It is probable the wearisome repetitions in my statements may give the
reader a distaste to following them out, and accompanying me through
them. It will, I fear, enfeeble the interest, which he might otherwise
take in the result. Besides, a higher tone of thought, of literary
taste, and intellectual feeling, would undoubtedly be much more pleasant
to him. The nature of the subject will not admit of it, and I cannot
help, in speaking upon a gross and indelicate subject, doing so in
a language as unpalatable to my own taste, as to that of the reader.
Besides, I am not master of any other words in the English vocabulary,
better calculated to convey to those for whom this book is intended, the
full meaning and purport of the statements which I make.
There is taught in the Romish church, and it prevails to an extent broad
and long as the land we live in, a doctrine which I feel it my duty to
explain to Americans, whether they are Protestants or converts to the
church of Rome. When I say that it prevails over the extent of this
country, I believe I should qualify the assertion, as I know not fully
and exclusively of my own knowledge, that American converts to the
Romish church are aware that such a doctrine exists; but I know that
European Catholic women, especially the Irish, are taught it by their
priests, and believe it as firmly as they do that their church is
infallible. It is a doctrine frightful even to think upon. I know
nothing, in ancient or modern times, in heathen, pagan, or Mahomedan
creeds, of equal turpitude. It is calculated to overturn all laws, human
and divine. It aims a fatal and deadly blow at the root of the whole
social system. It snaps, it shatters, it tears into shreds, every cord
that binds community to community, man to man, wife to husband, and
child to parent. It is this. Married women, who have no children and
never had any, are taught by Romish priests that, in case they have no
children, the church has the power of giving them fecundity, and thus
enabling them to "comply with the great object of their creation," viz.,
"to increase and multiply." The holy church, in her wisdom, or rather
in her craft and deep knowledge of human nature, knows full well that
married ladies, especially those who have property, are often unhappy
because they have no children; and the priests, looking upon this as
a fine opportunity not only to indulge their own passions but to make
money, tell such women, in the confessional, that they have the power,
specially delegated to them from Almighty God, of giving them those
children for which they are so anxious. I well recollect an instance
of this Romish infatuation--this worse than hellish belief. It proved
a source of much trouble to myself in after life, and I believe I may
partly trace to it the very origin of my difficulties with the Popish
priests in this country.