Continued from Chapter III. War against Protestantism Part 2.

The Jesuits.—Their Character.—Their —Expulsion by Roman Catholic Governments.—Their Suppression by Clement XIV.—Causes of it.—His Bull.—Expelled from Russia.—Causes of it.—Their Restoration by Pius VII.—Their Support of Monarchy.—The Order not Religious.—Its Constitution.—Its Authors.—They Denounce Protestantism as Infidelity.—They Threaten the Inquisition. Movements during the Rebellion.—Napoleon III. and Pius IX.—Intolerance of the Latter.—Precedents of Kings Humiliated by the Popes.

GREGORY XVI., whose pontificate commenced in 1831, was the first pope who seemed encouraged by the idea that the papacy would ultimately establish itself in the United States. His chief reliance, as the means of realizing this hope, was upon the Jesuits, upon whose entire devotion to the principles of absolutism he could confidently rely. Prepared at all times to labor for the suppression of freedom, and trained in a faith which allows to the individual no personal right of thought or action, they were both ready and willing agents in the work of assailing our popular institutions. With them no form of government has the divine approval unless founded upon the principles of monarchy. They especially abhor that form which confers equality of civil and political rights, which denies the authority of privileged classes, and forbids the establishment of ecclesiasticism.

This wonderful society— the most wonderful the world has ever known—had been suppressed in 1773 by Pope Clement XIV., after a tedious and thorough personal investigation of all the accusations against it. By this act of condemnation, which was made at the instance of the leading Roman Catholic powers, such a degree of odium was stamped upon its character that the people everywhere held it in execration. Its despotic principles and immoral teachings were alike condemned, except by those who, like Gregory XVI., saw that, in the compactness of its organization and the unity of its purpose, it possessed important elements of strength, which it was always willing to employ in building up the papal structure.

There is no more instructive chapter in history than that which records the events connected with its suppression by the pope. The expulsion of the [Jesuit] Order from France, Spain, Portugal, and Sicily—all Roman Catholic governments—the hesitation of Clement, his careful and deliberate investigation of the charges made against it, and the overwhelming proofs which forced him to conclusions he had manifestly endeavored to avoid, all go to show an amount of turpitude which is without parallel elsewhere.

The pope was reluctant to fix the pontifical censure upon it, because it had received the sanction of a number of his predecessors; but as an honest and sincere Christian—which is not denied, except by the Jesuits—he felt himself constrained, by a sense of duty to the Church and the world, to declare its unworthiness. And, in doing so, he satisfied the Roman Catholic governments against which treason had been plotted by its members, and restored quiet, for a time, to the Church.

In his pontifical brief, Clement XIV. averred that the Jesuit “maxims” were “scandalous, and manifestly contrary to good morals;” that the society had bred “revolts and intestine (internal) troubles in some of the Catholic states;” that, by means of its practices, “complaints and quarrels were multiplied on every side; in some places dangerous seditions arose, tumults, discords, dissensions, scandals, which, weakening or entirely breaking the bonds of Christian charity, excited the faithful to all the rage of party hatreds and animosities;” that the kings most devoted to the Church—to wit, those of France, Spain, Portugal, and Sicily—had “found themselves reduced to the necessity of expelling and driving from their states, kingdoms, and provinces these very Companions of Jesus,” which they were compelled to do as a step ” necessary in order to prevent the Christians from rising one against another, and from massacring each other in the very bosom of our common mother, the Holy Church;” and that, as the Church could never “recover a firm and durable peace so long as the said society subsisted,” he, therefore, was constrained to annul and extinguish it “forever,” to “abrogate all the prerogatives which had been granted to them by their general and other superiors in virtue of the privileges obtained from the sovereign pontiffs,” and to announce to the Christian world that his pontifical act of suppression “should forever and to all eternity be valid, permanent, and efficacious,” and be “inviolably observed” by all the faithful everywhere. (*)

The Jesuits, by the immoral tendency of their doctrines and the many enormities perpetrated by them against governments, society, and individuals, had become so unpopular throughout Europe that their suppression gave great and almost universal satisfaction. It was especially approved by all sincere Christians, because they saw that it removed from the Church a load which was surely dragging it down. And those who, without belonging to the Order, had been educated by it, were constrained to approve the act, because it was done by an infallible pope, who could not err! This sentiment of approval became stronger in proportion as the practices and policy of the order became better known. The public were then enabled to see how entirely at variance its practices were with its professions. Although one of the articles of their constitution forbade the members of the Order from the acceptance of any dignity, and another recommended holy poverty as the bulwark of religion, yet there were among them 24 cardinals, 6 electors of the empire, 19 princes, 21 archbishops, and 121 titular bishops; and their aggregate wealth amounted to 40,000,000 pounds sterling the enormous sum of $200,000,000!

Their general, Lorenzo Ricci, was arrested, and thrown into prison in the castle of St. Angelo at Rome, charged with all attempt to stir up a revolt against the papal authority—with plotting treason against the Church and the pope within the consecrated walls of the Vatican. Besides his confession that he had been in secret correspondence with the Prussian monarch, the other evidences of his guilt were so convincing that his imprisonment lasted until 1775, when he was relieved from it only by death. (Note: According to Rulers of Evil by F. Tuppper Saussy, Lorenzo Ricci’s death may have been faked so he could go to America and be the top advisor to General George Washington during the American Revolution.)

The passions of the order were, of course, aroused to exceeding violence—even to such an excess that the pope himself, although the infallible “vicar of Christ,” did not escape their vengeance. They published malicious libels against him, charging that he had been guilty of simony in procuring his election, and calling him by the opprobrious name of Antichrist! They became so impassioned in their attacks upon him, that, when his death occurred, during the next year, under very suspicious circumstances, they were charged with having procured it by poison!(*)

The consequence was, that, on account of the extreme contempt in which they were held in all the Roman Catholic states, they were compelled to seek refuge elsewhere. Their iniquities were so great, and were so well understood, that there was not a single Roman Catholic government in Europe that would tolerate them. They found shelter only within the dominions of Frederick the Great of Prussia, and Catharine of Russia—the former a Protestant prince, and the latter the ecclesiastical head of the Greek Church.

There is some difficulty in discovering the reasons which influenced these monarchs in consenting to receive the fugitives, but they were, probably, twofold: to cultivate the principles of monarchy, upon which the Jesuit constitution was based; and to reconcile the Roman Catholic citizens of Poland to the partition of that unfortunate country. Whatever the motive was, however, they were subsequently expelled also from Russia by an imperial decree of Alexander, wherein he declared:

“It has been, however, proved that they have not realized the duties imposed on them by gratitude, and that humility commanded by the Christian religion. Instead of remaining peaceable inhabitants of a foreign land, they have endeavored to disturb the Greek religion, which, from time immemorial, has been the predominant religion in this country. They began by abusing the confidence they had obtained, and have turned away from our religion young men who had been entrusted to them, and some weak and ignorant women whom they have converted to their own Church. To induce a man to abjure his faith, the faith of his ancestors, to extinguish in him the love of those who profess the same belief; to render him a stranger to his country, to sow tares and animosity among families, to tear the son from the father, the daughter from the mother, to stir up division among the children of the same Church—is that the voice and the will of God, and of his holy son Jesus Christ?…. After such actions, we are no more surprised that these monks are expelled from all countries, and nowhere tolerated. Where, in fact, is the state that would tolerate in its bosom those who sow in it hatred and discord?”(Nicolini, p. 434.)

The marvelous influence of the Jesuits was not entirely destroyed, even in the Roman Catholic states, although greatly weakened, by the suppression of the order, notwithstanding the bull by which they were suppressed was issued ex cathedra, and was, therefore, the official act of an infallible pope! Since their pontifical incorporation by the bull Regimini Militantis Ecclesice, issued by Pope Paul III. in 1540, it had so thoroughly permeated all orders of society that it was still visible, more or less, in every direction. By subverting the morality of the Gospel, and substituting their immoral maxims for religion, and by endeavoring to destroy all the “fundamental laws which form the basis of all states and governments,” they “brought the Encyclopedists into existence; the most conspicuous of whom, in fact, as Voltaire, Diderot, Helvetius, Marmontel, St. Lambert, Lametrie, and many others, had issued from Jesuitical colleges, or had had Jesuits as their tutors.”(Gioberti, apud Nicolini, p. 437.)

And when, after the French Revolution, it had been demonstrated to the sovereigns of Europe that it was not impossible for the people to attempt the destruction of monarchy and the establishment of republican institutions, and it became necessary for them to counteract and, if possible, to destroy, the influence of this sentiment, the reestablishment of the Jesuits was considered, by many of them, as the most certain and effective means of accomplishing that object. (Note: Now we know why the Jesuits were allowed back into the nations that kicked them out! It sure makes sense.)

On the part of these sovereigns, the motive was entirely political; but they had no difficulty in enlisting the assistance of the pope, who had as ardent attachment as any of them to the principles of monarchy, especially to that part of the Jesuit constitution which teaches implicit and unquestioning obedience to superiors. Pius VII. was then pope. The complications in which he had become involved with Napoleon I., who had re-annexed the states of the Church to the empire of France, declared himself King of Italy, and forbidden the pope to hold communication with any church in France, made it necessary for him to resort to some measure of relief against the threatened destruction of papal authority. The Jesuits seemed to him to be the most fit auxiliaries in the work of regaining power, inasmuch as the superiority of a single individual as the governing authority over the inferior masses of the people constituted the central idea of their system; and he, accordingly, reestablished the order in 1814, after they had been under the pontifical ban for thirty— seven years.

Besides the political motive which influenced the sovereigns who favored the restoration, he had, also, a religious one, which was to counteract the influence of Protestantism, then rapidly gaining ground in all the states of Christendom. By his memorable bull for the purpose—Solicitudo Omnium—he referred to the “abundant fruits” which had been produced in Russia and Sicily by the workings of the Order, and declared that, in the then dangerous condition of “the Christian republic,” it would be “a great crime” if he did not reestablish it—if, said he, “placed in the bark of Peter, tossed and assailed by continual storms, we refused to employ the vigorous and experienced rowers, who volunteer their services, in order to break the waves of a sea which threatens every moment shipwreck and death.”(Nicolini, p. 442; Cormenin, vol. ii., p. 423.)

Therefore, with an utter disregard of the character and authority of Clement XIV., he abrogated his “apostolic letters” of suppression; [Pope Pius VII.] restored the Society to all its powers; declared that it should be consolidated “more and more, to render it stronger;” counseled its members to “exactly observe the rule prescribed by their founder;” and announced that, notwithstanding all that Clement, an infallible pope, had said and done, it would hence forth be considered an act of “audacious temerity” for anyone to “oppose” his infallible decree; “and that, should anyone take upon him to attempt it, let him know,” said he, “that he will thereby incur the indignation of Almighty God, and of the holy apostles, Peter and Paul” (Nicolini, p. 447.)—that is, that the curse of God would rest upon whomsoever should believe what his predecessor, Clement XIV., had said about the immoral maxims and dangerous teachings of the Jesuits, or should dare to obey his pontifical brief! In such a contest of authority, the last pope always has the advantage. He can make his pontifical power, as one of the chief elements of his infallibility, more immediately and sensibly felt.

This act of restoration was done with cool audacity, and with the especial object of arresting the progress of the modern and advancing nations. It should excite no surprise, therefore, that the Jesuits, when, seventeen years afterward, Gregory XVI. became pope, availed themselves of their renewed strength and partially revived popularity in the Roman Catholic states to convert the papacy into a machine for the advancement of their ambitious projects. Under such favorable auspices, they were soon enabled to get control of and shape the whole policy of the papal court.

Gregory XVI., yielding to their influence as well as his own inclination, became a despot, and the supporter of despotism in its most odious and oppressive forms. The severity of his pontifical government soon excited the people of Italy to assert their independence, and to inaugurate an effort to deprive him of his temporal crown; and, to defend himself against them, he threw himself completely into the arms of the ultramontane or Jesuit party. As the chief object of this party was to check the popular progress toward freedom in the papal states, as well as elsewhere, the pope soon identified himself with such measures and principles as rendered him extremely odious to a large part of his Roman Catholic subjects, who were tired of papal bondage. And this feeling against him was, doubtless, increased on account of his supposed want of private virtue. Whatever was the cause of his unpopularity, however, he not only realized it, but had sagacity enough to know that the corruption prevailing at Rome, before the eyes of the people, would, if he lost his temporal power, cause him to be driven away from that city, and lead, in all probability, to excesses similar to those which had attended the French Revolution; for at Rome, as well as in France, the people had witnessed so much impiety that they were driven almost to the conviction that religion was a mere disguise, worn for selfish and iniquitous purposes. And he also knew that the habitual intolerance of the papacy, and its despotic management of civil affairs, would incite the enraged population to deal harshly with him and his ecclesiastical advisers; and that he would not be likely to find a safe or desirable asylum among the similarly enraged populations of any of the Roman Catholic states. And it was on this account that his attention was directed toward the United States, and the hope was excited in his mind that the tolerance of our institutions would enable him, through the agency of his Jesuit allies, to build up a papal party here, sufficiently strong and powerful to regain the authority which the papacy was destined to lose among the Roman Catholic populations of Europe. The thought was creditable enough to him as a politician, but it is one against which the people of this country should not be slow to protest whenever they are informed of its existence in the papal mind, and of any attempt to effectuate such an object.

Apart from the kind of service which Pope Gregory XVI. expected of the Jesuits, it is exceedingly difficult to tell why they have been suffered to acquire such unbounded influence as they possess over all the affairs of the papacy, and why they are considered so necessary to the prosperity of the Roman Catholic Church. They call their society a religious association, but it is scarcely entitled to that designation. The Church existed until near the middle of the sixteenth century without it. Eighteen of its ecumenical councils had been held before its formation. By these—commencing with that of Nice, in 325, and ending with that of the Fifth Lateran, in 1512—the religious faith of the Church was well established. The bishops who composed these councils needed no aid from Ignatius Loyola and his followers to take care of the affairs of the Church, either to declare its doctrines or to regulate its discipline. The “Society of Jesus,” therefore, when it was established by Pope Paul III., not only did not do any thing to add to or improve the doctrines of the Church, but, like all others who belonged to the Church, its members professed no other religion than that already established by the ecumenical councils. Its organization was entirely outside the Church.

Wherefore, then, the necessity of establishing this, the most secret society in the world, when the popes at all times have declared that God’s curse is resting upon all secret societies? Manifestly, the object was to build up an association capable of exercising external power, not necessary to religion, but as the means of training and educating those who were brought under its influence, by means of schools and the confessional, to that submissive obedience upon which the Papacy is founded. Paul III. avows as much in his bull establishing the Order. He says that it is designed “expressly for the instruction of boys and other ignorant people in Christianity, and, above all, for the spiritual consolation of the faithful in Christ by hearing confessions.”(Nicolini, p. 28.) And, as if the Church did not already possess the means of giving instruction and hearing confessions, he empowers “some among them,” meaning Loyola, to “draw up such constitutions as they shall judge” necessary. They have no power to add to or take from any of the articles of faith. Their religion is prescribed by the Church; their constitution is their own, and to it alone must we look for the nature and character of their organization.

Now, let any reader take the pains to examine the provisions of the constitution of the “Society of Jesus” and he will not find one word in it essential to religious faith, nothing to show what Christ, or the apostles, or the fathers, taught in reference to any of the fundamental doctrines of Christianity. On the other hand, he will find provisions for the initiation of novices, for scholars, coadjutors, the professed, provincials, rectors, superiors, and administrators; the duties of each being minutely defined. Much pertains to the working of the machinery; but there are certain principles running through the whole organization which sufficiently show how little claim it has to be known as a religious society. Each member is required to take a vow that he will understand “all things according to the constitution of the society;” that he will regard the general of the society as “holding the place of God;” that he will go wherever “the pope pro tempore chooses to send him;” that he will consider the general as “absolute master of persons and things;” that “there should be no will, no opinion but the general’s,” and no opposing, no contradicting, nor showing an opinion, in any case, opposed to his; that he “must regard the superior as Christ the Lord, and must strive to acquire perfect resignation and denial of his own will and judgment, in all things conforming his will and judgment to that which the superior wills and judges;” that this virtue of obedience “must be perfect in every point—in execution, in will, in intellect; doing what is enjoined with all celerity, spiritual joy, and perseverance; persuading oneself that everything is just; suppressing every repugnant thought and judgment of one’s own, in a certain obedience….and let everyone persuade himself that he who lives under obedience should be moved and directed, under Divine Providence, by his superior, just as if he were a corpse, which allows itself to be moved and led in any direction;” that no earthly authority “can involve an obligation to commit sin, mortal or venial, unless the superior command it in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ; or in virtue of holy obedience;” and that each member must “concentrate all his desires and affections upon the Society,” even to the extent of putting away “all strong affection for his parents.”(*)

It is stated by Maclaine, in a note to “Mosheim’s Ecclesiastical History,” that when Loyola first laid before Pope Paul III. the plan for the organization of his society, and desired his approval of it, there was a provision which restricted somewhat the promised obedience to the pope. This having given rise to objection, it was so changed as to bind the order “by a solemn vow of implicit, blind, and unlimited submission and obedience to the Roman pontiff;”(Maclaine’s “Mosheim,” vol. ii., p. 45, note.) which removed every obstacle. Herein lies the true secret of the papal attachment for this mysterious organization. It accounts for its re-establishment during the present century (18th.) by Pope Pius VII., and the readiness with which Pope Gregory XVI. subsequently permitted the Jesuits to direct his pontificate. They were “vigorous and experienced rowers;” and in consideration for the privilege of shaping the policy of the papacy, they were always ready to obey the papal commands, although, in doing so, they should be required to put themselves in secret and insidious conflict with all existing governments. Undoubtedly, Pope Gregory XVI. understood this, when, finding the people of Italy and other European states struggling hard for republican forms of government, and seeing the temporal scepter slipping from his hands, he declared that he was not pope anywhere else in the world except in the United States!

It should excite no surprise that the present pope, Pius IX., in the midst of still greater embarrassments, should suffer similar thoughts to obtain possession of his mind; inasmuch as, by the same attachment to the Jesuits, he has equally secured their services and devotion. When, at the beginning of his pontificate, he was supposed to be influenced by other motives, and gave assurances that many of the abuses in the civil government of Rome should be reformed, he felt himself secure in his position without their aid. But after he has lived to realize, what Gregory XVI. so much feared, the loss of his temporal power, he, like him, trusts the papal bark to the same “vigorous and experienced rowers,” hoping that it may find safe mooring in the United States; realizing, as he does, that it is only under the shelter of Protestant toleration that the members of this proscribed society can now find a resting—place. Therefore, in June, 1871, on the 25th anniversary of his coronation as pope, when he addressed a deputation of Roman Catholics from the United States, he was led on by the earnestness of his zeal to speak of this country as if he considered it the last and only hope for the papacy. The number of this deputation was only twenty—six; but the imaginative pontiff became so enthused that he exclaimed, “Look at all America!” evidently considering them as representing the whole nation. After one of the priests—the Rev. Mr. Leray, of the Natchez diocese—had delivered to him an address on behalf of the bishops, clergy, and laity of that diocese, the ” Holy Father” made a response in which the following sentences occur:

“I have heard of what has been doing in America in favor of the Vicar of Jesus Christ—of the meetings that have been held there. I have continually received testimonials of attachment and proofs of devotion from the Catholics of the United States—devotion not only of the mind and heart, but of the hand too….. The bearing of the Catholics of the United States fills me with hope for the future of the Church. You are a numerous people, and I know you have all kinds of men among you. There is a party of opposition, who teach everything contrary to law and order; men who have gone among you to disseminate every kind of evil, who have no reverence for God or his law; but, still, the progress of Catholicity is such as to fill us with well—grounded confidence for the future….. There was a cardinal once who was a prefect of the congregation….. He was wont to prophesy about America. It was a prophecy in a broad sense….. He used to say so earnestly that the salvation of the Church would come from America, that it made a deep impression on me, and I hold to it. I believe great blessings will come to the faith from America, and I pray for you always that God may spread his truths among you, and that they may take deep root, flourish, and bear fruit.” (Freeman’s Journal and Catholic Register, New York, June 22d, 1871.)

This language is not difficult of interpretation; its import can be easily perceived. Manifestly, the amiable old pontiff has suffered himself to be persuaded into the belief that the Roman Catholics alone are the lawful possessors of the United States, and that the Protestants, composing “a party of opposition” of “all kinds of men,” have “gone among ” them, teaching “everything contrary to law and order,” and “every kind of evil,” without any “reverence for God or his law.” He seems to think that this state of things can not last always, because “the Catholics of the United States” are devoting “the mind and heart,” and “the hand, too,” to the removal of the evil of Protestantism out of the way. He is not censurable, either for this belief, or the words in which he expresses it, having no knowledge of the temper of our people, or of the nature and spirit of our institutions, in any other wise than as he esteems them to be in antagonism to the papacy. His followers mislead him by their intemperate zeal and wild prophecies of success.(*)

Nevertheless, he has information enough to know that his hope and expectations are chiefly based upon the fact that there is no other place in the world, except under the protection of Protestant toleration, where the papal defenders possess the freedom necessary to avow the principles of the papacy without molestation, and without incurring such opposition from governments and peoples as has already dealt it a deathblow in every Roman Catholic country in Europe. Undoubtedly, he relies upon this toleration, as opening a broad field for papal operations; and hence the exceeding activity of his hierarchy in the United States in executing the task he has assigned them.

Pius IX. has none of the private vices of Gregory XVI. and many other popes to answer for, his purity of life being freely admitted on all hands; but he is none the less ambitious on that account, none the less under Jesuit control, and none the less resolved upon employing all his pontifical power to strike down every thing, and to abrogate every constitution and law, which stands in the way of the complete triumph of papal absolutism over the world. Evidences of this abound in all the history of his pontificate since his first flight from Rome to escape the vengeance of his Roman Catholic subjects.

While assigning these purposes to the pope and his hierarchs, however, we should not fail to keep in mind the distinction between Roman Catholicism, as a system of religion, and the papacy, as an all—absorbing religio—political power, founded upon human ambition. Nor should we forget that distinction which exists to a great extent, especially in the United States, between intelligent Roman Catholic laymen and the priesthood. There are thousands of these laymen who do not and can not, in their consciences, approve of all that is done and said in behalf of papal supremacy in this country, in any other sense than as they suppose it to involve the mere triumph of their religious belief over all opposing forms of faith. They believe Protestantism to be error, and all its forms of religion to be false; and yet, in return for its toleration to them, would be perfectly willing to extend like toleration to it, even where they had the power to withhold it. But these men, good and faithful citizens in all respects, suffer themselves to occupy a false position, by allowing their acquiescence in that to which their judgment does not assent, to be inferred from the silence which the papacy imposes upon them.

But the priesthood, especially the Jesuit part of them, compose an entirely distinct and different class. They are educated, instructed, drilled, and set apart for the special work in which they are engaged, with no other thoughts to occupy their minds and no other earthly objects to accomplish. They are the servants of the papacy, in the same sense in which a slave is the servant of his master, and are indebted to the pope for all the enormous power they employ. They swear obedience and submission to him as the infallible “Vicar of Christ;” and perfectly well understand that if they failed to render this obedience and submission to the full extent demanded by him, their official robes would be instantaneously stripped off. They are simply a band of ecclesiastical office—holders, held together by the “cohesive power” of a common ambition, as compactly as an army of soldiers; and are governed by a commander—in—chief whose brow they would adorn forever with a kingly crown, and who wields the papal lash over them with imperial threatening.

All these, with exceptions, if any, too few to be observed, are laboring, with wonderful assiduity, to educate the whole membership of their Church up to the point of accepting, without hesitation or inquiry, all the Jesuit teachings in reference to the papacy, as a necessary and indispensable part of their religious faith; so that whensoever the papal order shall be issued, they may march their columns, unbroken, into the papal army. These are they who write books, pamphlets, and tracts, and fill the columns of their newspapers with fulsome and blasphemous adulation of the pope, applying to him terms which are due only to God, all devoted to the object of exterminating Protestantism, civil and religious, and extending the scepter of the papacy over the world. They manufacture, to order, the literature of Romanism, and tax their ingenuity to the utmost to make it, in all its variations, center in these grand designs. Examples are innumerable, and almost any one of them, selected from the multitude, is an index to the remainder.

In 1862, a Jesuit priest, the Rev. F. X. Weninger, made what he chose to designate “an appeal to candid Americans,” on the subject of “Protestantism and Infidelity,” which is the offensive title to his book. Hie represented himself as having been engaged for thirteen years “as a Catholic missionary throughout the United States,” and, consequently, as having had extraordinary opportunities of observing the character and habits of our Protestant population, as well as having become familiar with the working of our institutions. These facts were stated, of course, to give weight and authority to his opinions; for while he professed to be addressing Protestants, but few of whom would see his book, he was, with true Jesuit cunning, really addressing the members of his own Church, with the design of convincing them that Protestantism is already a failure, so as to stimulate them to renewed activity in their exertions to repress and exterminate it.

He scarcely enters upon his subject before announcing that “Protestantism is ending in the desolation of heathenism;” that :is, that we, in this country, are fast becoming paganized, as the result of our total want of religion or of any religious convictions. Then, in contrast to this alarming condition into which we have been plunged by our infidelity, he points us to Roman Catholicism as furnishing the only means of making us acquainted, personally, with Christ. He says: “The real presence of Jesus Christ makes a heaven of every Catholic Church on the whole earth,” for there he can be conversed with “face to face,” every day and every hour.(“Protestantism and Infidelity,” by Weninger, pp. 38, 39.) He blasphemously insists that “in holy communion Jesus enters our interior, really and substantially, body and soul;”(Ibid., p. 47.) and that Protestantism, having robbed us of all this consolation, has left us “no better off than infidels and Jews.”(Ibid., p. 49.) Hence he found no difficulty in concluding that “the only consolation Protestantism as such has to offer, is a wicked one—sin, but believe;” (“Protestantism and Infidelity,” by Weninger, p. 11.15) his over-anxiety to assail Protestantism rendering him oblivious to the fact that his own Church, and the order to which he belongs, both teach that popes and priests may sin, and yet remain the infallible representatives of God; and may be guilty of all the impurities of life, and yet administer, infallibly, all the sacraments of the Church! (“Catechism of the Council of Trent,” pp. 73,74.)

As if he were an oracle whose opinions were not to be questioned, he says, “Protestantism leads to despair, be cause it denies free—will.” (“Protestantism and Infidelity,” by Weninger, P. 85.) That it is “a religion of immorality.” (Ibid., p. 90.) That it is “a religion of disorder and despotism.” (Ibid., p. 93.) That it is “a religion of blasphemy.” (Ibid., p. 96.) That it “came from licentious, apostate priests and monks, and from despotic, licentious sovereigns.” (Ibid., p. 102.) That it “is dead.” (Ibid., p. 150.) That it cherishes “a reckless disposition to calumniate.” (Ibid., p. 213.) That “modern civilization does not spring from Protestantism.” (Ibid., p. 252.) And that infidelity is the “last logical consequence of Protestantism.” (Ibid., p. 278.)

All the counts in this formidable indictment are so drawn as to display the skill and ingenuity of a criminal prosecutor; of one who has had experience in all the formalities of arraignment. They were designed, undoubtedly, to stimulate the ardor of the papal followers, in their efforts to remove all this irreligion out of the way; and, possibly, to cause all timid—minded Protestants to shudder at the thought of the rapidity with which they were hastening to destruction. He rolled these terrible accusations, like a sweet morsel, under his tongue, and, at every repetition of them, sharpened the point of his pen, that he might give them irresistible and convincing force. He made his real object, however, more apparent as he proceeded; and, in the midst of an enumeration of “Protestant prejudices,” which he felt it his duty to overcome, he expressed his pent—up feelings in these words:

“One of the most glorious enterprises for the Catholic Church to engage in at this day is the conversion of the United States to the Catholic faith.” (“Protestantism and Infidelity,” by Weninger, p. 270.)

Now, if the consummation of this object were sought for in the field of fair discussion, without any dogmatic assumption of superiority on the part of either adversary, each remaining the equal of the other, according to the spirit of our institutions, all Protestant Christians would, in true charity, hail Roman Catholicism as a desirable auxiliary in the work and duty of evangelizing, not merely the United States, but the world. The Roman Catholic Church, stripped of the influence of Jesuitism and brought back to its early purity, would possess the capacity to perform a most glorious part in such an achievement. But no such liberal idea as this finds any place in the mind of this author, or of any other Jesuit, or of any of those who submit to their dictation. From such men liberalism finds no quarter. They exhibit nothing higher or nobler than that supercilious air of imagined superiority, which roots out every generous faculty of the mind, and leaves its possessor an object of mingled pity and contempt. Thus impressed, and fearing that he would fail in rallying the militia of the Church to the support of the papacy if he—did not speak plainly in defense of the temporal sovereignty of the pope over the whole world, this infatuated Jesuit thus declares:

“In the ceremonies for the installation of a new pope, he is addressed in these words: ‘Noveris te urbis et orbis constitutum esse rectorum. Remember that thou art placed on the throne of Peter as the RULER of Rome and the world.’ (Ibid., p. 259.)

In order, however, to make his Roman Catholic readers familiar with the manner in which the pope would rule thee world, when the power to do so was secured to him, he had, a little while before, addressed a threat of vengeance to the Protestants of the United States, in order that they might experience a wholesome dread of their approaching doom in time to avoid it by penitence and submission. After defending the Roman Inquisition as a necessary part of ecclesiastical organization, and coupling his reference to it with the Protestant complaint of the unmerited persecution of Galileo, he says:

“Protestants would do better never to mention Galileo, in order that we may not, in our turn, be forced to inquire into their own excesses of religious hatred.”(“Protestantism and Infidelity,” by Weninger, p. 249.)

This is such an exhibition of cool audacity as we seldom meet with. Here is a foreign priest, sheltered by our laws, who clinches his fist, and shakes it in our faces, daring to tell us that we will “do better” to let the car of the papacy, with Jesuit conductors, roll unresistingly over us; for if we do not, we shall be punished, after the manner of Galileo, for our “excesses of religious hatred!” He writes in admiring contemplation of Roman ecclesiasticism, which recognizes external power as necessary to a perfect plan of church organization—the power to coerce obedience when other means are unavailing, to resort to force whenever the pope shall decree its necessity. Pope Pius IX. had already committed himself to this system of policy, in submitting to the domination of the Jesuits; and they, in their turn, were preparing the faithful for the bold avowals of the Syllabus, which, only two years afterward, startled all the civilized nations. And the time selected by this author to do his part of this work in the United States displayed admirable sagacity and tact.

When his book made its appearance, our country was laboring in the travail of a fearful civil war. Immense armies were in the field, marshaled against each other in the most deadly conflict. It seemed doubtful which of the contending parties would win the final victory— whether the defenders of the Government would win or lose it. The doubtful nature of the contest; the apparent difference of opinion in reference to its result, even in the States supporting the Union; and other combinations of circumstances too recent to have been forgotten—all conspired to excite in the minds of European imperialists the hope, and, possibly, the belief, that the days of our civil institutions were numbered, and could not be lengthened out much longer.

Foremost among these royalists was “the favorite son of the Church” —the corrupt and false-hearted Emperor of the French—who, with one hand, ruled his subjects with unmitigated severity; while, with the other, he held the pope upon his temporal throne, from which, but for him, he would have been hurled by the outraged Italians after the battle of Solferino. With this perfidious monarch, it was a fixed habit to profess one thing, while doing, or trying to do, another. At the moment he announced that “the empire is at peace,” he was engaged in corrupting schemes designed to give perpetuity to absolutism. With him and the pope the thought was a common one that kings govern by divine right, and, therefore, that the choice of their own mode of civil government by the people is in violation of God’s law. Neither of them stopped to inquire what popular right would be trampled down by the re—establishment of this principle among those who had resisted and repudiated it; nor how much it would block up the way in which the car of progress was so triumphantly moving. These were matters they considered fit only for revolutionists and heretics, who, for daring to assert the right of mankind to self-government, were denounced as Protestants and infidels, and cut off, by bulls of excommunication, from all the sacraments and protection of the Church.

This unity of purpose and principle on the part of Napoleon and the pope led, without difficulty, to the adoption of a common plan of operations, which required no formal concordat to define its terms, whereby it was intended to secure the triumph of imperialism, and to plant the flag of the “Latin race” in every nation of the earth, especially in the United States, where, under the tolerance of Protestantism, Jesuitism was growing bolder every day. The plans of operation were, doubtless, well understood by the army of the hierarchy, which was first put in motion. They constituted the skirmish—line, the advance—guard, of the strong columns held in reserve. The special duty assigned them was akin to that performed by this Jesuit author of “Protestantism and Infidelity”—the arraignment of Protestantism as a fraud and a cheat, as infidelity and heresy, and, therefore, with the curse of God resting upon it—and thus to prepare the Roman Catholic mind throughout the world for that fatal blow which the imperial conspirators expected to strike.

To Napoleon III. was assigned the more dangerous and exposed, but not the more active, duty of augmenting the strength of despotism when the fall of our institutions should clear the chief obstruction out of the way. Accordingly, he intrigued with England and Spain to unite their armies with that of France, and send the combined force to Mexico, under the false pretense of protecting their mutual pecuniary interests, but with the real design, as subsequent events abundantly proved, of subjugating that country, already Roman Catholic, of placing its crown upon the head of an alien prince, and thus to prepare, upon the fall of our Government, to move up the papal armies from Mexico to the United States, and turn over this country to the “Latin race,” so that Rome should again become “the mistress of the world,” and its pope—king the ruler over the whole earth!(*)

The enterprise was of grand proportions; but it so happens that God disposes of the schemes of men as is most suited to his own providential government. Protestant England, discovering how she had been deceived and duped by the intrigue, withdrew her army in disgust. Roman Catholic Spain, becoming sensible of the inferiority into which the papacy had reduced her, and beginning to feel newly invigorated by the principles which prevail among the Protestant nations, followed the example of England, expelled her profligate Roman Catholic queen, and advanced herself so far toward Protestantism as to establish freedom of religious thought, in the face of papal remonstrances and protests. Napoleon, left alone, floundered for a while like a drowning man. He suffered poor Maximilian, his royal dupe, to be cut off in his young manhood, and caused his beautiful wife to pine away in insanity; and at last his army was driven out of Mexico, he himself was compelled to flee from France, his sword was broken, his diadem lost, and his name held in such universal execration by the French people that he dared not, for months before his death, leave his Protestant asylum to brave their indignation. Even the proud and gallant nation over which he ruled was betrayed into the burial of its national glory in a grave dug by a Protestant rival.

The Latin race, so lately entering, with high hopes, upon the conquest of the world, was humbled and humiliated before its Teutonic enemy. The kingly crown has been snatched from the brow of the pope by Roman Catholic hands, and he is now sending forth his piteous clamors for revenge, hoping to arrest the march of the world’s progress by rousing up some modern “Peter the Hermit,” who will lead another crusade and sacrifice millions more of human lives to win his royalty again. And the Protestant institutions of the United States yet exist. The foundation—stones remain solidly planted. The flag of the nation floats over all its territory. No star is missing from its folds.

Does it not seem that God is on our side? —that, if our Protestantism is infidelity and heresy, and Roman Catholicism the only true religion, instead of Protestantism advancing and the papacy going down into the grave, the very reverse order of things would have transpired? With these evidences of Providential guardianship, we may confidently hope for protection from papal and imperial aggression, unless we shall become indifferent to our destiny, forget our manhood, and fail in our duty to the institutions with which we have been blessed.

But although these enemies of our civil institutions have been thus discomfited, the pope is not disposed to abandon the contest. He struggles on like a brave man. Notwithstanding he is deprived of the support of such princely allies as gave victory to so many of his predecessors, he carries on the war with his ecclesiastical troops, upon whose devotion and blind submission he knows he can always rely, because they must become the sharers with him in whatsoever temporal power their combined exertions may win. At his summons of them by the Encyclical and Syllabus, he announced the extent to which he expected them to go in opposing all liberalism and progress; and the sentiments and opinions thus avowed by him have entered into all the literature of the hierarchy, and compose one of its leading and most important features. The war carried on by this means is not the less dangerous because it is covert and insidious.

The book from which the last quotations were made was written before the Encyclical and Syllabus, and when the French army was in Mexico, with the Roman Catholic priesthood of that country in full concert with it. But the author evidently considered that he had thereby but partly performed his task. Consequently, he has since made another effort to instruct the Roman Catholic conscience in reference to the duty of obedience to the pope, who is now expected to achieve by ecclesiasticism what Napoleon could not win by arms. His first work should be considered as merely a preface to the last, the two being required to fully develop the papal and imperial system.

In 1869, after the Encyclical and Syllabus, and in preparation for the Ecumenical Council, he published his second book, with this imposing title,” On the Apostolic and Infallible Authority of the Pope, when teaching the Faithful, and on his Relation to a General Council.” As a Jesuit, he could not, of course, do otherwise than assert the infallibility of the pope; and hence there are scattered about, at numerous places throughout his book, and in the midst of flagrant perversions of history, such avowals of his object as leave no doubt about it.

In the introduction he characterizes Protestantism and Roman Catholicism as “the armies of truth and error,” and says that these armies “are drawn up in the sight of the whole world, and prepared to meet in a decisive combat, for the very life of Christianity. It is time to define our position more accurately, and to let our enemies feel our strength, and the utter impossibility of engaging us in any compromise.”(“The Apostolical and Infallible Authority of the Pope,” etc., by Weninger, p. 11. )

These are brave words, bravely delivered. They are like the utterances of one who feels that his feet rest upon solid ground, and who knows the power in reserve behind him. Designed, primarily, to stimulate the courage of those to whom they were specially addressed, it may have been hoped, at the same time, that some timid Protestants might be startled by them. But for fear of failure in the first of these objects, he proceeds, soon after, to instruct the faithful upon the duty of obedience. He says:

“The pope teaches and defines, without previously convoking a council, or asking the formal consent of any body; and the clergy of every order, as well as laymen of every condition, are OBLIGED TO CONFORM, and do conform, precisely as Pius IX., in his capacity of head of the Church, so teaches and defines.”(Ibid., p. 14.)

One, and far the most important, of his methods of establishing this papal sovereignty, is by showing what the popes themselves have said and done in reference to it. On the assumed ground of their infallibility and incapacity to err, he lays down the foregoing, as the law of the Church, to which every Roman Catholic is “obliged to conform,” no matter what shall be required of him, under the penalty of excommunication and eternal punishment. He looks no farther than Rome, and looks there for everything. With him, God has established no other mode of making his will known to mankind than through the mouth of the pope. When he speaks, God speaks. And when he comes to notice the dealings of the popes with emperors, kings, and princes—that is, with governments foreign to the papal states—he gives prominence only to such examples as tend to show their supremacy over mankind; cautiously passing by such as show its frequent and spirited denial. All these examples he regards as having entered into, and as now constituting, an essential part of the law of the Church, which is to be observed, in our day, with implicit obedience. They are so nearly alike that a few of them will enable us to understand sufficiently the nature and foundation of this extraordinary claim of authority, to which we are so kindly invited to become subject.

Pope Boniface IV. wrote to King Athelbert of England as follows:

“If any king succeeding, or any bishop, clergyman, or laic, shall essay to infringe the decrees of the popes, he should incur the anathema of Peter and of all his successors. (“The Apostolical and Infallible Authority of the Pope,” etc., by Weninger, p. 226.)

Louis the Pious, son of Charlemagne, submitted the division of his empire to the confirmation of the pope; and, says this author, “from that time it became the usage and practice that the Franco—Roman and German emperors became such only with the consent of the Roman pontiff, and on being crowned by him. Nor was this the case with the emperors of the West alone, for the kings of England, Poland, Hungary, Croatia, Sweden, and Denmark loved to receive their crowns at his hands, and to place their dominions under the especial guarantee and protection of the Holy See.”(Ibid., pp. 228, 229.)

Somebody has said that the doctrine of the common—law lawyers, that precedent makes the law, is a very dangerous one, because, by means of it, error may often obtain sanction. This is undoubtedly the case with these papal precedents; for if they are to be recognized now as conferring rights which are not to be called in question, then all dispute is at an end, for “Rome has spoken!” It is alone by these precedents that this comprehensive authority of the popes is maintained, and it is for this purpose alone that these references are made by this author. True, he avoids any direct discussion of “the question of political right,” yet takes care to let the papal followers understand that these examples prove it also to belong to the pope, because, in the instances cited, all “the peoples and princes” regarded him “as the vicar of Christ and the supreme arbiter of all on earth, according to the saying,’He who is competent to the greater is also competent to the less;'”(Ibid., p. 229.) that is, he who derives his right to govern in spiritual things directly from God, must govern also in temporal things, because the spiritual are greater and higher than the temporal. He shows this to be his meaning by telling us what Count de Maistre teaches on this subject in his “Essai sur les Maeurs,” where he says that all the Christian princes considered the pope “to be a judge between them and their people;” and also by quoting, with approbation, what the same author says in his “Essai sur l’Histoire Generale,” as follows:

“The interests of mankind demand a bridle by which princes may be restrained and the people saved. This bridle might by common consent be placed in the hands of the Roman pontiff. Such a high-priest, mingling in worldly conflicts only to silence them, admonishing alike the sovereign and his people of their duties, condemning their crimes, and visiting his excommunication on great wrongs, would be looked upon as the living representative and likeness of God upon the earth.”(“The Apostolical and Infallible Authority of the Pope,” etc., by Weninger, p. 230. )

In support of this theory of the pope’s temporal right to exercise dominion over the world, so as to mingle “in worldly conflicts,” and keep mankind to the line “of their duties,” accordingly as he shall decide what is right and what is wrong, he also cites numerous instances to show that, for many years, emperors and kings recognized it in relation to themselves and their subjects, and gloried in their humiliation. He gives special prominence to the case of Henry II. of England, who was “obliged” to prostrate himself before the pontifical throne, and submit to the decrees of the pope. And also to that of Frederick Barbarossa, who was forced “by the heavy hand of God to bow his head and sue for pardon.”(Ibid., pp. 235, 236.) And to enforce his views still more strongly, as well as to give the utmost influence to the precedents by which he endeavors to establish the temporal authority of the pope, he quotes from an address to him by the “Queen mother of Richard the Lion-hearted,” wherein she said:

“Did not the Lord confer plenitude of power on Peter, and on you through him? Blessed be the Lord who gave such power to men, that no king, no emperor, no duke can withdraw himself from its jurisdiction. The prince of the apostles still governs in his see, and a judicial power is constituted in our midst. Draw, then, the sword of Peter. The Cross of Christ takes precedence of the Imperial Eagles, and the Sword of Peter goes before that of Constantine.”(7)

He also considers it important to show that this doctrine, so earnestly recommended for adoption in this country, and by which all the world would be necessarily and unavoidably placed under the rule of the papacy, had the sanction of other emperors and kings, including Philip and Frederick II., of Germany; Philip II., St. Louis, Louis XI., Charles VIII., Henry IV., Louis XIII., and Louis XIV., of France; and Henry VII., Henry VIII., and Mary, of England.(“The Apostolical and Infallible Authority of the Pope,” etc., by Weninger, p. 236.)

How faithfully he follows the course of a lawyer in a common-law court, who lays down his premises and supports them by showing that numerous judges have made decisions of the like character. And yet it seems not to have occurred to him that he is attempting a task of difficult achievement; that is, to make the people of the United States, including numbers of Roman Catholics, believe that imperialism, even in its mildest form, is preferable to the political liberty they now enjoy. In every instance he has referred to, including popes, emperors, kings, and princes, the parties were united in their exertions to establish the “divine right” of kings to rule the world, in opposition to the right of the people to govern themselves, and solely with the selfish motive of continuing their own power. None of them had the slightest regard for the rights of the people, and all supposed, as the defenders of the papacy now do, that the people were made to be governed, not to govern, and that they required, as Dr. Brownson says, a master! They were all personally interested in doing exactly what they did, in order to keep their crowns safely upon their heads; and, considered unitedly, they were conspirators against human freedom. If now we are to recognize what they did and said, as establishing a law for our government, we might, with like propriety and by the same process of reasoning, justify the most abominable and demoralizing vices, by showing, what it would be easy to show, that they were all, including some of the popes, adepts in almost every form of corruption.

At the times when these examples were set, the bulk of the European people were in a state of profound ignorance, and it was essential to the “divine right” of absolutism that they should be kept so; for, in their ignorance, they were taught by ambitious, cunning, and corrupt priests to believe that the pope was equal to God. While this delusion existed, they dared not resist a king or prince, however tyrannical, who had the pope’s endorsement; for that would have been considered a violation of God’s commands, and punished by excommunication and anathema. Hence, these kings and princes were careful to obtain this endorsement, and the popes were equally careful to see that the light of intelligence was shut out from the popular mind, so that, by a continuance of the delusion, they could share between themselves the government of the whole civilized world.

They must be bold and presumptuous men who ask us, as these Jesuit missionaries do, to exchange the present condition of our affairs for that they so fondly picture—to undo what the people, acting for themselves, have so nobly done in resistance to misgovernment and tyranny, and plunge, in blind submission, and at a single bound, back again into medieval times.

When Luther, at the Diet of Worms, demanded to debate his thesis with the emissaries of the pope, he struck a terrible blow at the doctrine of passive obedience; which it is now sought, with so much earnestness, to revive. Whatever may have been his religious belief—and no Protestants of this day are responsible for it—he then became the champion of free thought, and, as such, courageously planted himself on the side of the people, and between them and their oppressors. On that simple basis, he laid the foundation upon which a magnificent fabric has since been reared, and he who now attempts to pull it down should be treated as a public enemy by all free people. By his example, he taught the people to think, and reason, and investigate for themselves. The scales fell gradually from their eyes, and they came to realize the character and nature of the popish and princely tricks by which they had been cheated out of their liberty; and at last roused themselves up into a vigorous and robust manhood. They snapped asunder the chains of their servitude, and asserted, in the face of their rulers, those great liberties which were never firmly established as legal rights until the Government of the United States was formed, and Protestantism was thereby enabled to achieve a full development.

Protestantism has, therefore, become the special guardian of these liberties; while the papacy remains, as ever, their deadly and malignant foe. The former clings to them with undiminished affection; the latter aims at them its most deadly blows. The Roman Catholic hierarchy of the United States join in with this insatiate hostility, and are leaving no stone unturned in their efforts to persuade their adherents to return to the old order of things. Their greatest and strongest argument is that repeated by Dr. Weninger—because these iniquitous compacts between popes and kings, in past centuries, have made it the law of the Roman Catholic Church that every human being should be governed by “the King of Rome,” as God’s representative; therefore, the modern and progressive idea that the people shall make their own governments and laws is infidelity and heresy, and deserves the anathema of the Church and the curse of God!

And presuming upon either the submissiveness or ignorance, or both, of those who are called “the faithful,” they assert their authority to command in the name of the pope, with a supercilious air which can only arise from an imagined superiority to the remainder of mankind. Dr. Weninger is a distinguished and conspicuous member of this class, and, with seeming assurance of obedience, he exclaims:

“Yes, the Catholic world at large, without any difference of nationality, hemisphere, or zone, acknowledges also in our times, by an interior conviction of faith, the apostolic see as the highest tribunal on earth in matters of faith, and the Roman pontiff to be the infallible teacher of the faithful peoples on the globe.”(“The Apostolical and Infallible Authority of the Pope,” etc., by Weninger, p. 247.)

It can not fail to arrest attention that, in whatsoever mode the writers of this class speak of the pope, they all reach the same result—the omnipotent power of the papacy, and its absolute incapacity to do any thing wrong. When they speak of “matters of faith,” as this author does, they intend to include the temporalities of government, and such civil and political rights as American Protestantism has guaranteed. This has already partially appeared, but it will be seen more undeniably hereafter. It has also been demonstrated that the papacy teaches that Protestantism is heresy and infidelity, no religion at all, a mockery of God; and, therefore, this Jesuit author teaches that all Roman Catholics are bound, by duty to “the highest tribunal on earth,” to exterminate it, and to plant Roman Catholicism in its place; so that the pope, as the only “infallible teacher,” shall prescribe the laws and institutions we are to obey, and appoint his ecclesiastical officers and agents to see that they are executed, to reward the faithful and punish the refractory and disobedient.

Why are books containing these and other kindred teachings published and circulated in the United States? Why is it necessary to fix such principles in the minds of the Roman Catholic part of our population? What have they, as citizens of the United States, to do with such royal examples as these books set before them? with the claims of authority asserted, centuries ago, by emperors, kings, princes, and popes? Protestantism tried hard to exist among these tyrants, but could not, except in a modified and imperfect form, because it could not reach its consummation where political bondage existed; and these imperial despots could, none of them, live in the atmosphere of freedom. Each required congenial nourishment suited to its nature; Protestantism demanding liberty, and imperialism bondage. And, therefore, Protestantism sought a new world, and left the absolutism of popes and kings in possession of the old, to oppress, persecute, and tyrannize, under the plea of “divine right.” It occupied a field which Providence had preserved for it, wherein it could work out its own results without fear of a rival. But now, when in the full tide of successful progress, it finds itself confronted by its old enemy, who has grown up here under its protection; and who, just as imperialism is threatened with destruction in all Southern and Western Europe, is endeavoring, with unbounded impudence, to destroy it, at the risk of all angry and deadly conflict between the principles of democracy and those of monarchy. And with no less unbounded effrontery, it points us to the combinations of—despots, to their impious claims of divine sanction for all the wrongs and outrages they have inflicted on mankind, and to the approbation given them by crowned popes, to prove that precedents thus furnished have ripened into rights which the world must recognize as sanctioned of God, and which have thereby become the law for the government of mankind.

For such a work as this the hierarchy of the United States seem well and peculiarly prepared by education and inclination. It remains to be seen, hereafter, how many submissive followers they can enlist under the papal banner, with mottoes like these upon it. In the mean time, those who have the heritage of Protestantism to guard and defend should not be unmindful of the triumphs it has already won, the brilliant future lying before it, if preserved; and the ignominious grave into which it must sink, if lost.

Continued in Chapter V. The Pope

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