the learned Maitland (a Romanist) say respecting the spiritual power of the church militant on earth? I lament, abhor, and am amazed at the superstitions, blasphemies, and idolatries which have grown out of that opinion.

PHILOSOPHY OF HISTORY.

But, after all, Schlegel's censures of modern philosophers are as just as they are severe. His palpable mistake, however, consisted in attempting to trace every phase of error to an unnatural root, viz., the Reformation. For assuredly no unprejudiced mind can venture to assert that Rationalism, Scepticism, Pantheism, and Atheism necessarily sprang out of, or had their source in, that which was essentially in itself holy, just, and good. Liberty of action is inherent in every moral mind. It is essentially a Christian principle-hence St James calls it the "royal," or as Philo said, the "divine law of liberty," which diverges neither to the right hand nor to the left. This law of reason no doubt requires, as Schlegel says, divine illumination and guidance; but where was that light to be found but in the Bible, whose all-perfect law was given as a lamp to our feet, and a light to our path? That law, as I have proved, had for long been, and still is, hid from Romish eyes, as exemplified by the cruel imprisonment of Matamoras and his companions in the Spanish hulks, for the unpardonable crime of Bible reading! Nor can it be denied that that unjust sentence was fully acquiesced in by the "holy father" at Rome; for what was the purport of Pope Pius's late allocution? In his last "Brief" he declared that the Bible is "the gospel of the devil rather than of God," and he has repeated his anathemas in his late allocution! To say that these have only reference to the protestant translation is obviously absurd, for every scholar knows that our protestant edition is the best which exists. "Search the scriptures is a divine command, for they are profitable for doctrine, reproof, and correction, that the man of God may be made perfect and wise unto salvation. True, men may abuse their liberty-they may possibly use it for a cloak of maliciousness, or they may wrest and pervert it, as St Peter said, to their own destruction; but not so those who have learned Christ and have tasted the heavenly gift, and have felt the power of the world to cowe, unless they let the good word slip out of their minds, and thereby render it unfruitful. But even admitting the possibility of all this misuse of Scripture, as exemplified in the popes and prelates, as Pope Adrian admitted, what right has any man to deny me the true bread of life, that I might be fed on vile popish husks? If any one in these circumstances be perishing for lack of knowledge, will not the

righteous Lord call the careless shepherd to account, and require the blood of that lost one at his hands? Is it not enough that the careless shepherd has fleeced his flock and trampled down the spiritual pasture? Must he also defile the pure stream of eternal truth by pouring into its living fountain those waters of gall and wormwood which have rendered it so full of nauseous bitterness, that no human soul can drink thereof and live? Nay more, is it not a truth that heresies have sprung up in all ages, in the Greek as well as in the Roman Churches, and why not also in those of the Reformed? The only question is, do the Protestant Churches cherish them? Did not the Church of Rome claim Voltaire and others as her most accomplished sons? He sowed broadcast that Atheistic seed which grew up and flourished in the bosom of the Romish Church. Its fruit was the extreme of bitterness even to priestly taste! The goddess of reason was neither Elizabethan nor German. Hence she was not a Lutheran or a vile rationalistic protestant. She was of a less pure extraction, she sprang from polluted Catholicism, and yet her garments were all steeped in priestly blood! Schlegel in one thing is correct. The French revolution, he seems to say, was God's righteous retribution— sacrifice for sacrifice-blood for blood. The best and noblest of their race had long lain unheeded, having been inhumanly massacred on St Bartholomew's eve-the successors of those Jesuitical perpetrators during the revolution-lay unpitied even when weltering in their blood. And yet, after all, said Schlegel, whatever good has been or is, has sprung from Catholicism, and whatever evil has been or is, has as necessarily sprung Protestantism! Certainly that is a very great mistake. All history is to secular men a deep unfathomable mystery, an enigma; but to the Protestant spiritualist, all is ascribed to God's righteous government-exemplifying extreme patience and forbearance, and yet visiting the iniquities of the fathers on their unrepenting children unto the third and fourth generation of them that hate, and shewing mercy unto thousands of them that love, &c. And here Schlegel touches a chord whose vibrations affect alike every pious heart, whether Catholic or Protestant. It is a heavenly symphony, "Glory to God in the highest, good will towards men, and on the earth peace. Hence Schlegel shews that the peace of Westphalia was a final and not an interim settlement of the "rights" of two opposing parties, proceeding on a new principle which he calls the Christian law of love. Strange principle this, after thirty years of hate and war, even to the knife! Had not the Romish party felt its weakness, there never would have been such a concordat by which Protestantism was established on a political basis, and on which also rest those principles of international law which

still settle all mutual rights and privileges, by what is called the "balance of power," which keeps the worldly powers in check. And yet, after all, we have never seen a solid and permanent universal peace; neither are the people contented in any single State. Schlegel points to England, in order to shew that Ireland is her weakest side! Who does not know both the cause and its relative effect? Protestantism has relaxed and yielded much. Catholic emancipation has favoured the papists, by giving to them equal rights. But Popery, notwithstanding Schlegel's new law of love, remains in statu quo; that is, she is as absolute and positive, ungenerous and unmerciful, yea, as hating and as hateful, as from the very first! Hence her law is like that of the Medes, it changeth not. We (still) declare, define, and pronounce that it is essential to the salvation of every human being that he be subject to the Roman Pontiff. Whosoever obeys not, as Scripture declares (which is not true), "let him die the death," that is, "by the fire and burning of the pastoral office" (Bull of Pope Boniface VIII.)—and no mistake. Hence Schlegel pleads that a few of the Jesuits should be universally tolerated. He here lets out his cloven foot.

THE JESUITS.

Loyola was the founder of the "Society of Jesus;" the Pope approved. They were at first men of the highest talent, virtue, and true fortitude. Their labours were incessant, and they did much good; but, like all human institutions, the Society of Jesus soon degenerated, and having lost their original virtue, they became the moral pests of Europe. They became family teachers, and wormed out all family secrets and communicated them to the Pope. The books of Rome contained the name and history of every nobleman. They sowed dissensions in families to answer their varied ends. Their policy was so crooked that not one of their lines was straight. Pascal exposed and chastised them with a scorpion's lash; their precepts were so infamously immoral, that the Jesuits were banished out of Portugal, Spain, and France, even the Pope refused to receive them, and they were driven from his shores; thousands died from starvation. Thus ended the Jesuits in Europe, and the Society of Jesus was legally dissolved by the Pope. In Russia they are still tolerated. Pope Pius, however, has again reconstituted them, to serve him in his time of need, and they exist in force in Rome, in Ireland, and in Edinburgh. Their chapel at Lauriston has for its symbol a "bleeding heart." Little do men know the evil they have done and are still doing. What means that Jesuit's cry, "Ye millions, keep your powder dry, and bide your time!" Mean

while those whom we denounce from the altar, "let them die the death;" if not by burning, let it be by cowardly assassination! How can there be peace in Ireland where it is not a crime to violate the law of God? Thou shalt not kill, saith the Lord.

GODLESS PHILOSOPHY.

I have already said that Schlegel has justly censured that godless philosophy which sprang up some time before the eighteenth century. Sceptics have existed ever since the days of Cain. No marvel that they still exist. But it is fearful to

learn from Schlegel that a great portion of high and low in every society may be so characterised. When I come, said our Lord, shall I find faith on the earth? All things are evidently hastening on "the final consummation." "The end of

all things is at hand, a thousand years are as one day," said an apostle. Still it is instructive to learn from Schlegel the view he took of godless philosophy. There is no unity among Protestants, so said a Catholic bishop; "within itself (the Protestant Church), in so far as it is still possible to apprehend the idea of its autonomy, an unity of which the whole groundwork is an agreement to differ, while without, every child of rebellion, every hypocrite in diplomacy, every political bandit, with or without a crown, rush on regardless of principle towards the unhallowed goal of their ambition, viz., the uprooting of Christianity, and the deification of self-indulgence.' There is a just distinction well marked in the above quotation. True, the Protestant Church has its sections within, and its infidel opponents outside her pale-an "agreement to differ," even within the Church, is virtually a dictate of the eternal law of love. It was the basis of that peace which was established by the Westphalian convention. Hence it respected opposing national rights. Protestant dogmas generally have in them a reservation, "so far as agreeable to God's word;" but Popish dogmas, however revolting to reason and opposed to Scripture, admit of no such accommodation. They dogmatically assert, and as despotically command, "This affirm, and thou shalt live;""This deny, and thou must die the death;" not only temporally but eternally, in Platonic purgatorial fire, unless it please "my Lord God" the Pope to deliver from damnation all those souls whose relatives have as much piety as enables them to purchase their release! No marvel that it is said that there are no heretics within the bosom of the Church of Rome; still, after all there is a palpable disunity both in her internal and external organisation,

* THE COUNCIL OF TRENT.-The French ambassador alone appears to have spoken in favour of the Protestants, declaring that, so far from being the

a visible contention even unto blood. True, it is at present more characterised by political rebellion against absolute despotism, than by positive moral abnegation of its spiritual dogmatism-but what of that? Is not liberty sweet?

"For e'en the name of freedom is a jewel
Of mighty value, and the man who has it,
Even in a small degree, has noble wealth."

PHILO.

This name of freedom is well known in France, and is now still better known in Italy. Thus, when we see a new Italian nationality arising, and stripping the Pope of his so called vested rights, how natural is it for Protestants to view this unexpected phenomenon as a providential sign of the times, teaching every cause of the troubles which existed in France, they were the injured party. He plainly stated that abuses had crept into the Church, that reformation was necessary, and that the king and the whole French people expected reform. "If the fathers," said he, "should ask why France is not in peace? no other answer can be given than that which Jehu gave to Joram of old, What peace (can there be) so long as the whoredoms of thy mother Jezebel, and her witchcrafts, are so many?"

The Apocryphal books were declared to be of equal authority with the canon of Scripture, and that the traditions of the fathers (although full of contradictions) are to be regarded as of equal authority with the Holy Bible. The Vulgate translation of the Scriptures was declared the only true translation; and all persons who refused to subscribe to their final doctrinal decrees were to be anathematized, and (by the fire and burning of the pastoral office) cut off from the communion of the Church.

The Papal decree that followed prohibited all Catholics from writing notes or comments upon it, or even defending it without permission.

These decrees caused considerable murmuring, but the most refractory of all were the French. No commanding attitude on the part of the Pope, and no stratagem of dexterity on the part of his agents, could induce the Gallican Church to succumb. They specified no less than twenty-three articles, which were directly opposite, in their very letter, to the ancient usages of the realm, and as equally destructive of civil and of religious liberty. "In all which particulars," said the celebrated Pasquier, "we have found such a repugnance and contravention to our ancient liberties, that we can never be induced to receive this council." And he adds, "The Council (of Trent) seems desirous of establishing a new empire over kings, princes, barons, and every civil jurisdiction; wisely, then, has this Council never been received in France, by which, with the single stroke of the pen the Pope would acquire more authority than he has been able to do since the commencement of our common Christianity." And he concludes thus, "I have no intention to deprecate the good fathers of Trent, but I cannot help wishing that their zeal and devotion had been accompanied with a little more wisdom, and that, in guarding the pretended privileges of the Holy See, they had not furnished its real enemies with the fittest weapons to overthrow it."

Of all Catholic nations, France has been always the greatest modern opponent to Papal usurpation; and it is the influence which her ancient traditions have on the mind of Napoleon, that enables him even now to restrain and modify the Papal tyrant's power. If he dared to liberate France from Papal supremacy, he would not only establish his dynasty on a sure basis, but gain for his name immortal renown. If the Pope loses France, the first son of the Church, he has no other alternative than to throw himself into the arms of Russia! But be it so, Ezekiel predicted that the Assyrian tyrant shall be slain on the mountains of Israel!

M