ordinances, no human exertions, can cleanse us from its pollution; that the evil is too powerful and too deeply seated to yield to such remedies as these. We should see that the matter will not admit, for a moment, of doubt or argument. Our feelings would at once refute the most subtle reasonings. There is indeed a fountain which has power to wash away sin and uncleanness; but this is a spiritual fountain provided and opened, not by man's power, but by God's mercy. These heavenly priests have discovered this sacred laver, and in their songs they point it out to us. We find them always ascribing the change which has passed on them to one cause, and giving to one Being all the glory. "Unto him, that loved us, and washed us from our sins in his own blood, and hath made us kings and priests unto God and his Father, to him be glory and dominion for ever and ever." 66 They have washed their robes, and made them white in the blood of the lamb;" that blood, which, the Bible tells us, cleanseth from all sin, and which can make the sinner's defiled robes as white as snow. "Therefore," says the text, "are they before the throne of God." This was the reason, why the everlasting doors of the heavenly temple were opened to them, while thousands of their fellow-sinners are for ever excluded from its courts" they were washed, they were sanctified, they were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus and by the Spirit of our God." pp 9-11.

Here we must close our extracts. A Volume of Sermons can be judged of only in this way, and yet, the extracts have a great disadvantage in being separated from the context. That may be a very excellent and useful sermon, which contains no striking passage taken by itself. We are, however, much mistaken, if these specimens will not succeed in interesting every reader of religious taste, in Mr. Bradley's volume. We hope the Author will be encouraged by the flattering success which this has met with, a success which we cannot but ascribe to the estimation in which he is generally held, to prepare at his leisure a second volume for publication. We do not recollect ever to have seen a subscription list at all approaching, either in the number, or in the rank of the names, to that which is prefixed to Mr. Bradley's Volume. It is dedicated, in a manly Preface, to the Earl of Liverpool.

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Art. IV. 1 The Protestant: a Series of Letters which appeared in the Glasgow Chronicle, and afterwards were published in weekly Numbers; together with the Replies of Amicus Veritatis and Paz. Glasgow, 18.8-Dublin, reprinted, 1819.

2. Tracts against Popery. Dublin, 1818. London, 1819.

IN

N again adverting to the subject of Popery, we deem it right to apprize our readers, that we intend to abstain from discussions of a political nature. Our remarks will have an exclusive reference to the religious tenets of the Church of Rome. That these tenets should be gaining ground in a Protestant country, is a fact which assuredly claims the most serious attention, quite irrespectively of any question of legislative expediency. We cannot contemplate with indifference the progress of Popery, believing it, as we do, to be Satan's Masterpiece.' When we complain, however, of the increase of Popery, it is not simply that it has increased in proportion to the increase of a growing population, but that its chapels have been thronged by the defection of adult Protestants, and by the education of the children of mixed marriages, in the principles of their Popish parent. In England, the fact is beyond dispute; chapels are rising up every where, but especially in the Northern counties. The principal 'Jesuit of Preston, we are informed on good authority, now makes a boast, that when he first came into it, (a little more than twenty years since,) a small room would have contained his whole congregation; at this time he proclaims with triumph, that two large chapels have been built, which will hold two 'thousand persons each, and that even these chapels will not hold 'their congregations. Before the establishment of this college, (the Jesuit,) there were not half a dozen Papists about Stoney'hurst, but now, the greater portion of the population in that part of the country are Papists. In the summer of 1813, there 'were confirmed in the three towns of Manchester, Liverpool, and Preston, alone, 3000 children*.'

There now lies before us the Laity's Directory,' 1819, containing, among other things, a list of the principal Popish chapels in and near London, and in diffe ent parts of the kingdom; and likewise specifying, by way of advertisement, the leading seminaries for the education of Popish children of both sexes. Of the former there are fifty-seven; of the latter, fifty-five. This publication also notices a London Mission Fand, a Midland Mission Fund,' and a Foreign Mission.' The object of the first two institutions, is to educate Priests or England; the latter is designed to support and extend Popery in Heathen countries. The following paragraphs connected with the notices of these

* Hist. of the Jesuits, Vol. 1. pp. 334, 335, and 339.

various Institutions, afford unequivocal proof of the nature and tendency of the doctrines of the Church of Rome, as held at the present time. As some persons have affected to be sceptical on this point, we wish particularly to direct the attention of our readers to the following extracts taken from one of the latest documents.

At the close of the notice soliciting the assistance of the Faithful for Westminster Chapel, it is said:

In return for the charitable aid of a generous Public, which duty requires Mr. Sumner to solicit for his distressed flock, he engages that the solemn sacrifice and the prayers of his indigent congregation, shall on the first Sunday of every month, be offered up to the Throne of Mercy, to obtain for them the rewards of that divine charity, which our adorable Redeemer descended from heaven, solely to enkindle in the hearts of all men.'

Hampstead Chapel.

The few Catholic gentlemen residing at Hampstead, having by the blessing of God and the sanction of the Right Reverend Dr. Poynter, succeeded in raising a proper and convenient place of worship, feel very great satisfaction in being able to inform those who have kindly assisted them and contributed to the good work, and all Catholics in general, that the new chapel was solemnly blessed under the invocation and in honour of the Blessed Virgin Mary, on Saturday the 17th of August, 1816, and opened by a solemn high Mass on the day following, being the Sunday within the Octave of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary, who is known in ancient times to liave been the Patroness of this place.'

St. Thomas's Chapel, Bloxwich.

N. B. At this chapel there is a society for the Dead, with a perpetual obligation Mass each month for the members of the society, established with the approbation of the Vicar apostolic of the Midland district.'

The Catholics of Leicester

hope in a few months to offer up the adorable sacrifice to the Almighty for those to whom under Him they owe the inestimable privilege of continuing to exist as a Catholic congregation, and a portion of the Universal Church of Christ on Earth.'

London Mission Fund.

Each person becoming a member, enjoys the benefit of having the holy sacrifice offered up for him the first Sunday of every monthand he also participates in the benefits of four Masses which are celebrated every week in the Bishop's chapel for its members and benefactors. Such are the advantages, and such are the objects, that are aimed at by this Institution, objects that should induce every Catholic, who is sincerely attached to the faith of his ancestors, to seize with gladness this opportunity of propitiating the favour of the Almighty, and laying up for himself immortal treasures in Heaven.'

Midland Mission Fund.

A half-penny or a penny a week will be most thankfully received. Fifty Masses are said annually for the Benefactors; the Rosary also is said once a week by the young men for the same institution and when they are Priests, they will say four Masses annually as long as they live, for those who have contributed towards their promotion to Holy Orders.'

Foreign Mission.-The following is one of three prayers which are to be recited every morning by the associates.

Remember, O most pious and tender Virgin, that it is a thing unheard of in all ages, that ever any one was abandoned by you, who ran to you for succour, implored your help, or begged your Intercession. Animated by this confidence, I, a wretched sinner, place myself in sighs and groans before you, entreating you to adopt me for your child for ever, and to take my eternal salvation into your own care: do not, O Mother of the Divine Word, despise my petition, but listen to me and hear me with a mother's tenderness.'

Once more: St. Aloysius Charity Schools are recommended on the following principle.

Can he who would secure an advocate at the awful tribunal of Eternity, find one that would address the Sovereign Judge with more persuasive eloquence, than a smiling host of innocent babes?'

All the public documents of the Church of Rome, exhibit in the most undisguised manner, those very doctrines which were broached in the darkest and most superstitious times. Purgatorian Societies are spreading every day; and it is a circumstance which deserves consideration, that were only one fourth of the Irish Catholic population to subscribe a penny a week, (the requisite sum for constituting a member,) the revenue of the Priesthood would be increased by no less a sum than £.215,666 13s. 4d. Miraculous cures are to be heard of both in Ireland and in England; the priests avowedly profess to cure the falling sickness; aye, and Protestants (proh pudor) have been known to apply to them. The Catholic party in Ireland venture in some things further than they could do in this country; they still print in their catechisms, the curtailed form of the Ten Commandments, so that the prohibition of image worship contained in the Second Commandment, does not appear; and we are full sure that no cemetery in England contains such a mortuary inscription as the following, copied from a monument lately erected in a grave yard in the city of Cork: Sacred to the memory of the benevolent Edward Molloy, the friend of Humanity and the Father of 'the Poor. He employed the wealth of this world, only to secure 'the riches of the next-and leaving a balance of merit in the 'book of Life, he made heaven a debtor to Mercy.'

Such is the system, which in these countries has increased, is increasing, and ought to be diminished.' The favour which is shewn to Popery by those who are indifferent to its nature and

character, has led many to suppose that its spirit has been essentially meliorated by the diffusion of knowledge and the general improvement of the age we live in; the case rather is, however, that the spirit of Protestantism has degenerated. It seems now to be regarded as a violation of decorum, to talk of Popery as our Ushers and Bedels formerly talked. The time is gone by, when opposition to Popery, as an unscriptural religion, was so much the characteristic of the English divines, that a celebrated expounder of prophecy did not hesitate to ascribe to the English Church the office of the Angel who cried: "Come out from among her, my "people."

The Work which stands at the head of this article, appeared, the first part of it, in the Glasgow Chronicle, and the remainder, in weekly numbers. The Writer gives the following account of its origin and progress.

My controversy with the Papists, originated in a paragraph supposed to be written by one of them, in the Glasgow Chronicle, relating to an Oratorio, which had been performed in their chapel for the benefit of the Catholic Schools. A few remarks upon that paragraph, brought forth a reply from Amicus Veritatis, and another letter from me. produced a second from a person under the same signature, and one by another papist under the signature of Pax. The controversy was continued in the Glasgow Chronicle, until it began to assume a shape, and take an extent of range such as to render it impossible that the Editor of a public Journal could give a place to the discussion with any degree of regularity-I have therefore determined to publish a paper every Saturday.'

This controversy turns much upon the nature of Indulgences, which the Protestant asserts to mean remission of sins, whereas, his opponents maintain, on the authority of the Douay Catechism, that it means only remission of the temporal punishment due for sin, after such sin has been forgiven by the Sacrament of Penance. All history, however, testifies against this interpretation; for it is not possible for any fact of the kind to be more fully established, than that the Church of Rome taught. and that the people believed, that there was an efficacy in the Pope's paccion, to deliver from eternal death; and notwithstanding the evasions and casuistry of the modern advocates for the doctrine of priestly forgiveness, whosoever is acquainted with the habits and modes of thinking prevalent among the Irish Catholics, must know that they are taught to expect, and do expect, deliverance from future punishment, through the pardons they receive. Tetzel's proceedings in Germany were, it is true, condemned, as Amicus Veritatis asserts; but they were condemned only because it suited the policy of the Roman Court to disavow him. Had any objections been felt against the doctrines he taught, as contrary to the Gospel, why not condemn the opinions of other individuals, who elsewhere