THE Roman Catholic church in Ireland presents at this moment a most extraordinary aspect, and calls upon its votaries to reconcile the most opposing inconsistencies. While it claims authority from the Redeemer, and professes to trace its antiquity to his immediate followers; while it boasts a faith immutable as the rock on which the church of Christ is founded, and appeals in all ages to the consensus generalis of that church; we see in its members the only body whose professions are disputed, and whose creed is denied, and while other less pretending societies can point to their formularies and their practices, and be believed, the prelates of this church, with the assumptions of 1800 years upon their fronts, are compelled at intervals to issue explanatory documents, softening, evading, or denying their own credenda. Now, if their church were one consistent structure; did it possess accordance with the Divine Will as revealed at one time, and by one set of persons to the world; were it otherwise than the motley result of masses of ill-cemented materials, collected indifferently in dark and in comparatively illuminated periods, which, while adding to the height, seemed for the moment to increase the strength also of the edifice; were it otherwise than this, could such an occurrence ensue? Could a Bossuet and a Gother, a Breerly and a Doyle, be compelled to employ their talents on vain attempts, to give a less frowning aspect to the monstrous fabric, and endeavours to seduce the unguarded Protestant, and to silence the awakened Romanist, by discovering how little in the dogmas of infallibility, it is essential for them to believe? VOL. II. 2 $ But the most singular circumstance is yet to come; at the very moment in which this attempt is made, and while Mr. Butler, in England, is endeavouring to smile away the indignation which his coadjutor Milner had excited, and while our Right Reverend prelates here were claiming for themselves a faith more according with the revelation of God, and the instructed feelings of his creatures, than that which Southey and Philpots and Townsend, had denounced; "the year of grace and mercy approached," the Jubilee was proclaimed from Rome, all its absurdities and blasphemies were recorded for the edification of the people, and the very prelates whose hands and seals to the declaration, had disclaimed the tenets which Protestants had imputed, have sanctioned in "the Pastoral instruction," all that can justify the most degrading statements of their opponents, ceremonies the most childish, opinions the most unscriptural, practices the most superstitious. Scarcely had we contemplated with astonishment and pleasure the altered features of their religion, when by the magic wand of the same great Wizard,* the illusion vanishes, and we see her standing before us in all the unexaggerated features of original deformity! We are grateful that Providence has dispelled the illusion -that as a Wake unmasked the sophistry of Bossuet, and a Stillingfleet that of Gother, so in our own day, the Letter from Edenderry interprets the statements in St. Stephens, and the Jubilee Pastoral enables us to understand "the fourteen articles"! It is almost incredible, that in the nineteenth century, in the age of liberality and reasoning and knowledge, piety should be shocked, and common sense confounded by the publication of “the Bull of the Jubilee." We are taught to believe, in language as unmeasured as could have issued from a John, or a Gregory, or a Leo, that the treasure of the precious merits of the Saviour and of his Saints, is entrusted to the Papal dispensation, to be disposed of as the successor of St. Peter may please. We are called upon to believe that pious pilgrimages to the shrines of the Apostles, and prayers offered up in St. Peter, St. John of Latran, St. Mary Major, and St. Mary beyond the Tiber, fulfil the injunction of "drawing water with joy from the Saviour's fountain;" that aid and protection besought from the glorious Virgin Mother, the holy precursor, and the Apostles and Saints, is in compliance with HIS will who is a "jealous God, and giveth not his honor to another;" and that the immense congregations of the faithful prostrate at the feet of Pius, "venerating the delegated authority of Christ, and testifying their obedience (colere) to the prince of the Apostles," presented a scene in strict accordance with his precept, "whose kingdom is not of this world." We are required to credit that the institution of the Jubilee is reasonable, true, and agreeable to divine revelation; that while Christ offered for * We believe the titular bishop of Leighlin and Ferns, is the perpetual Secretary of the Irish Roman Catholic Hierarchy. us a full and perfect atonement, divine justice exacts from the sinner something for the PERFECT EXPIATION of his sin; that while God reserves this to himself, the Pope has the power of dispensing with it at will, exchanging future punishment in penal fire for works of penance, which performed whether BEFORE OR AFTER our reconciliation with God, can move the Lord to compassion, and DESERVE from him to be REWARDED with a crown of justice— nay, that he can commute such penance into prayers said for any fifteen days in the next two years, in any church or churches to be pointed out; and that even such visits and sacramental communion, may be again converted into any other more convenient works:--and this mass of folly and impiety, which disposes of hereafter at the will of a weak and ignorant priest, which substitutes for the eternal Jubilee of the Gospel the Popish Jubilee of fifty years, which claims the power of dispensing with every description of vow, even those confirmed by oath,* claims Apostolic authority, and we are charged to believe, that this power is precisely similar to that by which the incestuous person was restored by St. Paul to the communion of the Corinthian church! And the prelates who have signed the Pastoral containing these monstrous statements, yet require to be believed, when they deny them,† and are offended at the imputations cast upon their creeds and practices. But it is time to turn our attention to the earlier Pastoral, which professes "to exhibit a simple and correct view of those tenets" of the Roman Catholic faith, "that are most frequently misrepresented-that all may be enabled to know with accuracy, the genuine principles of those men, who are proscribed by law from any participation in the honours, dignities, and emoluments of the State." But before we do so, we must remark on the singularity of the church of Rome not possessing any authoritative document, formulary, or series of formularies, by which an intelligent Protestant or Roman Catholic can gain possession of the exact creed by which that church is governed and directed. If a Protestant of the Established church be questioned as to his belief, he points to the Scripture as the sole foundation of his faith, and to the articles, creeds, and homilies, as the interpretation which he assigns to it. If the same question be put to a Roman Catholic, who had just before been boasting of the unity. of his church, of the universality of its communion, of the sameness of its doctrine and discipline, he refers you to the Council of Trent, which frequently determines nothing, and which is received or rejected as sovereign and people please to catechisms, which, if we believe Dr. Doyle's oath, are altered at the printer's will; to divines • Such is the extraordinary pow er claimed in the bull, while its saving clause but makes it more tremendous, by implicitly asserting the power of disposing even of the cases that are excepted. The curious reader is requested to compare the account of Indulgences given in Dr. Doyle's evidence, with the Pastoral Instructions, his acknowledged work-one was for Ireland, and one for England. who have no authority, and to canons, which have no promulgation. Does he refer to the creed of Pope Pius-that very formulary directs you for the articles of faith to canons and rules, which no Roman Catholic can enumerate, or perhaps discover. Does he point you to Councils; their best divines differ on the subject of these Councils, and receive or reject them as they please. Does he appeal to the note and comment which authority has affixed to the Scripture you find the text has no authority, and speaks by no ecclesiastical voice, and that these notes contradict each other, and the prelates do not venture to mediate between the contending parties. Such happy indistinctness does the creed of this church possess, that if you press on them the decrees of Councils and the uniform practice of the church, you are reminded of one distinction; if the meaning of words in their common signification, you are reminded of another-their very prayers cannot be said without a mental reservation-miracles are put forward by their divines as criterions of faith, and yet are allowed to be disbelieved; and the happy ambiguity with which Trent has invested all the obnoxious doctrines is fully equalled by the coolness with which their most learned prelate informs the assembled legislature of the Empire, that "the infallibility of the Pope is a very difficult question, but if the Committee would study the folio of Melchior Cano, they will know what he thought about the subject."+ Such is the fugitive nature of this church, that neither in doctrine, nor in discipline, can you fix its certainty, and its infallibility seems of such an happy kind, that by evading examination, it escapes detection. But let us turn our attention to the articles which are drawn up and signed by all the Catholic prelates, and let us examine them under a two-fold view, as to whether they speak the real sentiments of the Roman Catholic church, and as to the corresponding effect they ought to have on Roman Catholic practice. The former, because if it were to appear that this explanation were but the effect of expediency, and but a pretext to blind the Protestant church and public, that public would appreciate as it deserves the sincerity. of those men; and the latter as the best test of the reality of the profession. The Archbishop of Dublin has observed, that whenever political objects were to be attained by the Roman Catholic party, there have been studious efforts made to identify the faith of the Vatican with that of England, and we think that this design is apparent in those articles, however clumsily and inaccurately drawn up. It is remarkable, that of the thirteen articles which constitute their doctrinal declaration, four are exclusively devoted to political and civil objects, while several of the misrepresented and obnoxious tenets remain unexplained and undenied. It is our earnest wish, in the examination of these articles, to avoid the political spirit in which they are conceived, and to which they almost inevitably lead; † See some valuable observations on this subjeet in "The Digest of Evidence." we profess not to be politicians, nor would we stain the sanctity of the high objects at which we aim, by mingling them with those of "time and of sense." If then we seem to deviate from our rule and our practice, it is but the necessary result of the duty which is im posed upon us as CHRISTIAN EXAMINERS-and while we beg to disclaim any inference that might be drawn as to our sentiments on the question which agitates the Empire, should it appear, that the imputation of divided allegiance, which the Prelates disclaim no doubt in perfect sincerity, is not so easily removed, it may lead our Roman Catholic readers, should we have any, to suspect, that the constitution of this never-changing church, however calculated to found, on a spiritual basis, the temporal dominion of an aspiring priesthood, is not so fitted to remove all suspicion from the mind of the Protestant, and all conflicting duties from the practice of the Roman Catholic. In the first article, the subscribing prelates assume that as true of the (Roman) Catholic religion which belongs to Christianity itself;-it asserts, that "it is reconcileable with every form of Government, that republics as well as monarchies have thriven where it has been professed, and under its protecting influence, any combination of these forms may be secure.' This statement may be considered in a double point of view; either as stating the compatibility of the Roman Catholic religion with any form of government where that religion is established, or where that religion is tolerated. The former is the declaration which the words seem to bear, but the latter is the only one which would be german to the circumstances that called for the declaration. Now, the difference of the two cases is obvious, and while it might be conceded that such a statement would be applicable to the one, it might be essentially contradictory to the other. But let us examine the reasoning implied in the article. States have flourished under the Roman Catholic religion, therefore it is the true one or they have flourished, therefore it is fit for and is adapted to them. We question not the applicability of this religion, nor the ease with which it suits itself to circumstances; we know that in Christianity, even in its worst form, there is a redeeming power, which neutralizes much of the superadded evil, and enables its votaries to enjoy the essential good-but to carry on their argument the prelates should prove, as indeed they seem to assert, that the prosperity of these states was owing to Popery! Here we beg leave to hesitate, and when we remember the long struggles of the Plantagenets with the See of Rome, the holy wars excited in Germany, the bloody disputes about investitures, the wars of the league in France, the interdict in Venice, the Inquisition in Spain, we must protest, that it is rather in spite of the development of Papal principle, than as a consequence, that the states under its influence have prospered. If spiritual tyranny, drained exchequers, and an ignorant peasantry be proofs of prosperity, their statements are true, and that some countries have not suffered, or do not now suffer such evils, is en |