trious master, the pope, has been gravely pronouncing a benediction on the baby-linen to be sent to the infant princess of the queen of Spain, they exclaim with exultation, "O magnanimous and most indulgent prince! O most benignant and gracious Pio Nono !" I think, gentlemen, that you will hardly be persuaded by the language of this modern Proteus, Mr. Newman, to believe, in the teeth of history, and against facts which are daily attracting your notice, either that popery is so great a blessing that we ought gladly to put its yoke on our necks, or that it will cause no injury to us if we allow the pope to have supreme jurisdiction, and to enforce his canonlaw, in this empire. This Italian bishop professes, indeed, to rule over only his own subjects, or those who acknowledge his authority and pay implicit obedience to his commands; but it must not be forgotten that he claims all baptized persons as his subjects. For thus are his priests, from whose lips the Romanists are bound to receive instruction, taught at the college of Maynooth. "It is certain," Antoine writes, "that baptized infidels, whether heretics or apostates, can be compelled to return to the faith, and to keep the ecclesiastical law, whether baptized in their infancy, or baptized from compulsion and fear in adult age" *. Do not suppose, gentlemen, that this refers merely subtle and most successful in the use of her gifts. If, indeed, there is one offence more than the rest characteristic of Romanism, it is this-its indulging the carnal tastes of the multitude of men, setting a limit to their necessary obedience, and absolving them from the duty of sacrificing their whole lives to God. The further her pretended revelations are carried, the more minutely she investigates, and the more boldly she decides; in short, the more she outrages common sense and reason by her extreme audacity and peremptoriness, the more successful are her attempts upon the heart and the imagination of the many.' You look astonished, gentlemen, on hearing that such sentiments as these were ever expressed by Mr. Newman, the present encomiast-general of popery in all its branches; but your wonder will cease when you remember that even a false prophet is sometimes, like Balaam, constrained to speak the truth. You might suppose that some lingering sense of shame would have prevented this doughty champion of the Roman church from using the fulsome language quoted by my learned friend, when speaking of popery and papists, in his reply to the address of thanks for his lectures at Birmingham: but he is the creature of circumstances. He speaks as Rome enjoins. Having submitted himself to her yoke, he has no other resource but implicit obedience. For, as an elo-to those who have been baptized by the priests of quent clergyman has well observed, "Rome will not suffer a half-papist. She must have the whole man, body and soul. She will allow no epicurism in error, no delicate exceptions of conscience, no fastidious choice among the viands at her terrible table. The miserable being who feeds from her hand must lick the dust of her feet. He will not be suffered to take one doctrine and leave another. There is no gentle gradation in the disuse of his understanding. He must not be allowed to pay a sentimental homage to the divinity of the Virgin; he must bow down to the block that bears her name. He must bear the whole burden of her legends, rites, and extravagances, and acknowledge the virtue of St. Ursula's skull to heal all diseases, and venerate the power of St. Edmund's fleshless arm to shake down the turrets of Westminster abbey. Monstrous as the meal is, he must gorge it all"*. I quite agree, however, with Mr. Newman and my learned friend on one point; and that is, that protestants cannot see any thing "beautiful and sublime" in popery. While they use their eyes they must turn with disgust and indignation from this caricature of Christianity. But, when, like Newman, they put on the magic spectacles offered by the Roman sorcerer, straightway are things the most revolting clothed with beauty, and things the most ridiculous transformed into the sublime. They will then be enraptured at the sight of a grinning skull or a rotten bone; and, on learning that a cardinala prince of the Roman states-employs his dignified pen in determining to what extent "the faithful" may indulge their appetitest during Lent, in the fat from the dripping-pant, and that his illus Rome. All who have been baptized—whether by a popish priest, or by a protestant clergyman, or by any traveller, or even a layman, or a woman, or a heretict-all "are bound by the ecclesiastical law," says Bailly, "because by baptism they are made the subjects of the church". Neither are you to imagine that, because the pope's authority is not recognized by the laws of this country, the church of Rome does not claim all baptized persons as her subjects. She teaches her students at Maynooth that her "empire has no bounds but those of the universe, and it comprehends even those places where her authority is not recognized; in short, a custom contrary to this, introduced into places where heretical sects are dominant, can in no way impeach the authority of ecclesiastical law". Collet, another of the standard authors used at Maynooth, states that "all those who have been baptized, all those who entertain errors contrary to this (popish) faith, whether they have held them from the beginning or not, are bound under excommunication, and the other punishments that she declares against them". Yet my learned a time of penitence; i. e., during Lent. She was much troubled to know whether the bird was maigre or gras. She consulted a bishop who happened to dine with her. The prelate assumed a positive tone, and the attitude of a grave judge en dernier ressort. He answered the princess that he had decided the matter, when under similar doubts, in this manner: After the bird was cooked, he put it on a silver dish which was very cold, and pricked it with a fork; if the gravy from the animal became fixed (se figeait) in a quarter of an hour, the animal was gras; but, if the gravy remained in a liquid state (restait en huile), it might be eaten at all times without inquietude. Madame Victoire made the trial, and the gravy did not harden. This was a delight for the princess, who very much loved this kind of game" (Madame Campan's Memoirs of Marie Antoinette, p. 16). * Tractat. de virtut., cap. iii. † Treatise of Baptism, vol. v., p. 62. $ Deux Conferences D'Angers, tom. ii., sur les Loix, p. 15. friend has confidently told you that the pope's laws do not affect protestants! He means, of course, that they do not affect them so long as he is unable to enforce them. But only let him have the power, and then not only altar denunciations and excommunications will be fulminated against protestants, but also "the other punishments" which the canon law of Rome provides, such as "the confiscation of their goods, infamy, and incapacity for honours the punishment of exile, imprisonment, and death itself, about which, says Collet, "consult the title 'De Hæreticis' in civil and ecclesiastical law"*. .... Now, it is the object of the pope, by his recent aggression on this realm, to prepare the way for the enforcement of his canon law; and all the arts and blandishments, in which the emissaries of Rome are so adroit, are at this time employed to persuade you to allow his holiness to exercise, what they call, a very harmless jurisdiction among you. It is only spiritual, they a-sert, and will not interfere with temporal matters. But I would ask, who is to determine where the limits of spiritual power end, and those of temporal power begin? In the opinion of the Romanists the pope alone must decide this point. If, then, a case occur which we protestants unanimously consider a temporal matter, but which the pontiff declares to be spiritual, the papists, his spiritual subjects in this country, will obey him rather than their temporal sovereign. The jus divinum (under which designation must be placed, according to the doctrine of the church of Rome, all the decrees of its pontiffs) will overpower the jus humanum, * Ibid, p. 396. †That the church of Rome would have not only claimed and exercised power in temporal things, but have also been legally entitled to do so, had the late papal brief not been declared illegal by act of parliament, is the opinion of an eminent chancery barrister, Mr. Riddell, a Romanist. In his examination before the select committee of the house of commons on the law of mortmain, he was asked what would be the effect of the papal rescript, if permitted to be enforced in this country on the celebrated "Dodden-Green case," which may be thus briefly stated. It appears that lands were given, about a century and a-half ago, for the support of a priest to say mass, &c., in a chapel at Dodden-green, Westmoreland. The Riddell family had always nominated the priest, and no institution by the popish bishop was required. A Mr. Bingham was appointed to this chapel eleven years ago; but, after he had enjoyed the emoluments for some time, a new popish title to the living. The question was referred, says Mr. Riddell, to "the authorities at Rome, the propaganda. The authorities at Rome took upon themselves to adjudicate upon the question of a right of nomination. My brother acted upon my advice, and denied the authority of the Roman courts to adjudicate upon a temporal matter in this country." Mr. Bingham was placed by the propaganda under spiritual censures, if he retained the chapel without being instituted by the popish bishop; and he therefore ceased to officiate in bishop was set over the district, who objected to Mr. Bingham's that neighbourhood. Mr. Riddell told the select committee, in reference to this case, that it would be seriously affected by the papal rescript, "because," he said, "I couceive that, if a synod, held in pursuance of the authority of that rescript, were to decide this very point, namely, that a priest must receive institution before he holds a living, the court of chancery would be bound by that authority. This is a subject which I have considered a great deal; and I can refer to a very high legal authority upon it. I may mention the present master of the rolls, the present solicitor-general, and, as I have been informed, Mr. Kindersley, the master. They seemed to consider that the master, upon a reference as to a catholic charity in his office, would be concluded by such an authority" (Report of the Select Committee on the Law of Mortmain, &c., 1851. Q. 315 and Q. 559, the law enacted by a temporal legislature. This is the opinion of Bellarmine; and yet that learned Romanist did not carry the supremacy of the pope so high as the court of Rome expected, and he was some time in disgrace, because he admitted that the power of the pope in temporals was only indirect", that is, as certain Romanizers in this country express themselves respecting the queen's supremacy, it is exercised in "the temporal accidents of spiritual things." But, direct or indirect, whether the papal supremacy be exercised beyond or within the limits which Bellarmine assigns to it, I think you will agree, gentlemen, that it is totally repugnant to the free institutions of this country. For this is Ballarmine's statement of this qualified supremacy: "We assert that the pope, as pope, though he hath not any merely temporal power, yet he has, in order to spiritua good, the highest power of disposing of the tem poral goods of all Christians." Again: "The pope cannot, as pope, ordinarily depose temporal sovereigns, even for a just cause, in the same manner in which he deposes bishops, that is, as an ordinary judge; yet he can change dynasties, and take away (a kingdom) from one and confer it upon another, as the highest spiritual prince, if it be necessary for the salvation of souls"*. learned counsel well knows, that temporal lores It is still the law of the church of Rome, as the or princes are to be deposed, if they refuse to assist in the extermination of heretics. This was stated in the third canon of the fourth Lateran council, extermination of all heretics, "by whatever names under Innocent III., A.D. 1215. It requires the they may be called." Is this no claim to the exercise of temporal power? Or is the claim less objectionable, because it is not to be enforced until the church of Rome is powerful enough to carry it into execution? This spiritual power, although now in abeyance, was used to effect a temporal object by Pius V., when he issued his bull against queen Elizabeth, A.D. 1569; and this Docs my learned friend say, "O, this was nearly was again fulminated by Sixtus V., in 1588. three hundred years ago: things are altered now. we live in more enlightened times"? True, the times are altered; but is the church of Rome changed? Are her principles different from those she formerly held? Has she acknowledged that she is not infallible, by repudiating the blasphe mous decrees and tyrannical acts of former popes! No. She still boasts that she is unchanged and unchangeable. Is it said that, even if she wishe to enforce her laws in this country, she can only do it by spiritual or ecclesiastical censures? And are these nothing? Are they not dreaded by a her subjects? If they believe that excommuniobey her commands, should it even be at the cation endangers their souls, will they refuse to expense of duty and allegiance to their tempora sovereign? imaginary dangers : I tell you that the jurisdie"O," replies the learned counsel, "these are tion claimed is quite harmless in the present day." Well, if all history is to be disregarded, if even the arrogant language of the late rescript is to be considered a mere form and nothing more, let us, ** De Rom. Pontif., lib. v. Marsh's Comparat. View, &e, p. 217. at least, inquire how this papal supremacy works in countries where it is acknowledged. How did it operate in the Netherlands in 1823? The king's ministers were obliged to dissolve two religious confederacies, because they were dangerous to the state. What commotions were soon afterwards raised about religious matters by the pope's emissaries in Bavaria, Saxe Weimar, and Saxony! In 1825 there was a dispute between the Belgian government and the archbishop of Mechlin. And even that devoted slave of popery, Ferdinand of Spain, was obliged to forbid the pope's nuncio to enter his kingdom, so arrogant were the pretensions of the see of Rome in 1827. In the follow-swer to every overture for peace, the Romish ing year so much trouble was caused to the government of France by the jesuits, that the society was suppressed, although this measure was strongly opposed by the bishops. And what led to the revolution of 1830, by which the elder branch of the Bourbons lost the throne of France? Undoubtedly because Charles X. listened to the advice of the bigoted ecclesiastics who enslaved his conscience, and persuaded him to destroy the liberty of the press, and to bring the people under priestly despotism. Mere spiritual jurisdiction! Yes, gentlemen, so long as it is kept by the strong arm of the law within proper limits, it may affect great moderation; but no sooner are wholesome restraints taken away, than it begins to encroach on, and to aim at the subversion of, the temporal power. It will then be very unscrupulous as to the means which it uses to attain its object. Witness the combination of the Romish prelates in Belgium with the radical party-who were as hateful to each other as were Herod and Pontius Pilate-in order that they might overturn the protestant government. Recollect, also, that the Prussian government was obliged, in 1837, to send to prison the archbishop of Cologne, who had set it at defiance. Through the operation of this spiritual power on the Austrian government, in 1838, it was induced to drive into banishment all the inhabitants of Zillerthal, because they had become protestants. The same insidious power was at work in France a few years ago, for the purpose of discouraging the system of education established by the government; and it instigated that government to send an expedition to Otaheite to destroy the protestant missions-a cruel and disgraceful act, which had nearly led to war "All the world knows what has been done by pontifical command to check attempted civilization in Ireland, and to keep up deadly hate between the protestant Saxon and the papal Celt. And all the world knows the pretext for emperors, kings, and Louis Napoleon Bonapartes helping to bring back the days of Hildebrand and Paul III. But all the world does not know that Rome loves kings, or emperors, or military adventurers just as little as she loves the rabble, and is as ready to turn her hand against them. All the world does not know how long and with what satanic instinct the papal church has been preparing for the present development of the democratic element in Europe, nor with what consummate tact she counted on its incapacity for selforganization, and cruelly turned it to her own account. All the world does not know that La Mennais, like Ventura, was once the honoured of the Vatican-that the cry of universal suffrage was got up in France by the clergy in 1835; that already in 1837, so wise a statesman as prince Metternich (who at that time did me the honour to invite me to enter the Austrian diplomacy) seemed as well persuaded as the general of the jesuits (who hated him cordially), that Rome was likely, under democracy, to be as powerful as when under despotism. Aquaviva had dictated his individual will to between England and France*. We find, too, that the government of Sardinia has been recently obliged to banish two popish archbishops for their refusal to submit to the civil power. And what, I again ask, is this spiritual supremacy now doing in Ireland? In spite of the concessions made at various times for the purpose of conciliating the papal hierarchy-although protestant schools were discouraged, protestant clergymen impoverished, protestant parishes and protestant bishoprics sacrificed to this Italian Moloch, it would not be propitiated. Each concession led to fresh and unreasonable demands; and, in anpriesthood fulminated denunciations from their altars, and the land was, and continues to be, polluted by the shedding of innocent blood. Let not the learned counsel then wonder that England repudiates the spiritual no less than the temporal supremacy of the bishop of Rome. She will enter into no concordat with him. She has for centuries declared, and will continue to declare, that he "neither has, nor ought to have, any power or jurisdiction, civil or ecclesiastical, in this realm.” And, because such is her determination, the arrogant pontiff has issued his mandate against her. His late rescript virtually says: Since you will not acknowledge me as your spiritual father, you shall feel the effects of my power as a sovereign. Your laws, as well as your ecclesiastical organization, I hereby declare to be null and void; and, for the benefit of my numerous subjects in the united kingdom, I now supply them with a proper hierarchy, and will speedily favour them with my canon law, under the operation of which I expect that the other inhabitants of the land, who, being out of the pale of the catholic church, are no better than heathens and publicans, may gradually be brought into the fold where alone they can find salvation. It is for you, gentlemen, to determine by your verdict whether the agents of the pope shall, or shall not, proceed in their insolent and dangerous encroachments on the prerogative of the crown; whether Great Britain shall virtually acknowledge herself a fief of the so-called apostolic see; or whether she shall still declare herself independent of all foreign domination, civil or ecclesiastical, and show herself to be what she has ever been since the days of the glorious Reformation, the firm and uncompromising defender of civil and religious liberty. Europe, and taken equal vengeance on popes, kings, or com- as well as in Ireland. CONCLUSION. The chairman briefly and very impartially summed up, and left it to the jury to decide whether the cardinal was guilty or not guilty. They retired, and were for a long time debating about the verdict. One of the jurors, a Roman catholic, came forward to ask a question of the chairman, viz., whether they would not, by bringing in a verdict of guilty, condemn the pope? "Of course you would," was the reply. "But does not the canon law plainly state that the pope was called God by the pious prince Constantine? and it is clear that a god cannot be judged by man.'" "It is so stated." "And was not the canon law set forth by the assent and by the grace of the Holy Ghost'? and must not they who voluntarily transgress it blaspheme the Holy Ghost?""" So it is declared by the church"*. "Then my duty is obvious," replied the juror, as he retired. Soon afterwards the foreman appeared, and stated that there was not the smallest hope of their agreeing in the verdict. They were therefore dismissed. It is consequently left to the candid reader to determine this important matter. 6 "Godliness makes to men, not only their wealth and riches profitable unto them, but also all those inward endowments of body and soul, which God bestows upon men. For, whereas there are in us, as we are mere natural men, and strangers unto the covenant of grace, many excellent things, without godliness they are all nothing worth. In the fall of our first parents, some things we did utterly lose, and some excellent things did still remain; but the profit of them was all lost. They are unto natural men now as the rainbow was unto the world before the flood -the same still, but of no use. Add but only godliness to natural graces, and forthwith they shall become exceedingly profitable. This alone is that which gives them a loveliness and Corp. Jur. Can. Decret. pars 2, caus. xxv. Quæs. i. c. 5, et Dist. xcvi. c. 7, Satis evidenter. .... beauty, which is of force to attract and draw the favour of God unto them. These natural graces, they are at the most only, as it were, the matter and body of a Christian man-a thing of itself dead, without life; but the soul and life that quickens the body is godliness. They are of the same kindred and brotherhood with godliness; and God is the common Father to them all; yet without godliness they find no entertainment at God's hands. As Joseph said unto his brethren, "Ye shall not see my face unless your younger brother be with you," the same is the countenance of God towards these: they shall never come to have any part of that blessed vision of God wherein all happiness doth consist, except this brother' be with them" (John Hales' "Golden Remains"). H. S. ETERNITY: A Sermon, BY THE REV. JOHN MCKEE, B.A., "And these shall go away into everlasting punish The text speaks of eternity. It declares that, whatever be our condition in the future world, it shall continue everlastingly. And I desire to fix attention on these words of our blessed Lord, that, if possible, the lesson may remain. 1. First, then, let us remember how certain it is that eternity to us, which is spoken of in the text. All things with concurrent tes timony teach us to look forward to it. The soul within is sensible of its destined course. It feels the glowing energy, and has the foresight of immortality. We all antici pate but a change of state at death: we think not of annihilation. The mouldering dust before us in the graveyard, which once was part of man, and fashioned into fair and noble shape, now lying there all cold and decomposed, the only visible remains of one whom formerly we had known, raises no thought of final utter dissolution. Standing even there upon the graves, and over the indistinguishable relics of buried thousands, we doubt not that they are, and shall be; nor doubt we more then and there of our own ceaseless being. For the soul cannot rid itself of the impression which it has about the future, nor will it surrender the hope of immortality. Go where we may, it is the same. If we travel to the distant heathen, to the very remotest of their tribes, unblessed as yet with gospel light, and ignorant of our philosophy, even there we find a similar assurance of a future life, though less distinct and fainter certainly than where revelation dwells. If we go backward to antiquity, to Greece and Rome, when they were still the slaves of a corrupt and vain idolatry, there too we learn that the same idea of an eternity prevailed which is entertained among ourselves. The almost infidel will declare that he cannot divest himself of the belief that he shall live for ever. For the soul in all speaks the same language, and testifies to this solemn truth. Creation also lifts its voice in evidence of eternity. An apostle thus appeals to it: he says "the invisible things of God from the beginning of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things which are made, even his eternal power and godhead; so that men are without excuse", though they have no written revelation. His argument is this, that the things which are seen and temporal are demonstrative of those other things which are unseen and eternal. And this they are in many ways. Creation shows the wisdom, power, and greatness of the Creator, and that he cannot cease to be. Creation also glorifies the Creator in the beauty, variety, and immensity of his works; and they shall not cease to be. Can the time ever arrive, when he who delights to manifest himself thus will cease to do so, and when all his works shall have an end? Or can that grand and astonishing system of created things, that universe, the magnificent and incomparable temple of Jehovah, can it be destined after a few short fleeting years to come to nothing, to pass away like a shadow or a dream? We walk forth into the cool night air, and we gaze upon the vault of heaven, sparkling with innumerable stars, and the moon passing in her brightness: they teach us that the hand that made them is divine, and that he who made them can sustain them. We know, from the discoveries of modern science, that, excepting one or two which are nearest to us, those lights are the splendours of other suns, enlightening other celestial regions, and revolving each with its attendant planets under the eye of the Supreme. We think how great are their numbers, and how vast their dimensions, and how infinite the space in which they move without confusion, appearing but as specks of light to one another amid the heavens, from the immensity of their distances. We try to pass in thought their limits, and to conceive of the myriads more tar on beyond them, whose light, though travelling with the lightning's speed six thousand years or more, has yet not reached us; into whose trackless orbits no instrument of the astronomer shall ever pierce. Still we are far from any adequate conception or comprehension of that universe, which, with its innumerable worlds, stretches away on all sides from our globe immeasurably, and without end. But we see and know enough to ask the question, and to answer it satisfactorily to ourselves, Shall all these disappear? shall they endure but for a very little while, to perish utterly? Can the Creator wish to blot out the sight and even the remembrance of those glories? And shall the immensity of space be left unoccupied, a desolate wilderness, a blank, a dark and fathomless void, without any sign of that God who now so wondrously reveals himself therein, and without a single created thing to whom he may any longer be revealed? Our heart grows cold at such a thought, and reason cries, Impossible! Such design, such beauty, such immensity give the promise of duration infinite as themselves. Creation's works may change indeed according to the well known law of nature. They may all assume a better form, like as did this earth on emerging at the first from its original chaos, and like it is said that it shall do again when it comes forth from the final conflagration. universe may thus change. It may be renovated, and decked with greater loveliness, and disposed in more harmonious and pleasing order. But it cannot cease to be. The great Creator's works cannot pass into oblivion. The mind does not, and cannot, look forward to their annihilation. Thus the vast inanimate creation testifies of eternity, an eternity through which it will exhibit its wondrous mechanism, and an eternity not too great for the evolution of its mighty and exhaustless movements. The And is there no eternity for man, the chiefest of the Creator's works, made after his own image? for man, whom he has raised up to be the spectator of his glorious acts, and the setter forth of his praise? Shall he be favoured less than Jehovah's other creatures, and sink forgotten and for ever to the grave? Or shall not he also live, and be advanced even to a higher |