ed, that a work so well adapted, in other respects, to be useful, should contain matter, unnecessarily introduced, be cause not properly belonging to the Popish controversy, which, though not relating to a fundamental point, they sincerely thought was calculated to mislead, and, as far as it might be believed, to exert an injurious influence. We pass over a few minor points, in several other chapters, on which we are constrained to differ from the worthy author, but concerning which we do not think it necessary to trouble our readers with remarks.

Our principal reasons for the present notice of Mr. Faber's work, are two. The first is, because we really wish, as far as we conscientiously can, to promote the sale and circulation of a very respectable volume, which, notwithstanding its faults is adapted to do good. The second is, because we feel the deepest solicitude, that our clergy, more particularly our candidates for the sacred office, and as many of the members of our Church as possible, should consider themselves as called upon to read and think much on the Popish controversy. It is by far too little understood, even among intelligent Christians; and the "signs of the times," we think, demand special attention to it. Whatever we may be doing, the Pope himself seems to be directing particular attention to the United States. Very large sums of money are every year appropriated to the support and extension of his communion among us. Ecclesiastics of that communion are constantly pouring into our country in great numbers. They are sagaciously fixing important settlements, and Seminaries of popular character, in districts of country very poorly supplied with sounder teachers, and, therefore, more liable to be seduced by their errors. They are taking every practicable method to attract Protestant children to those Seminaries. And converts to no inconsiderable amount have already appeared as the seals of their ministry. If these be not serious and awakening facts, we

can scarcely say what ought to be so deemed. Can it be doubted, then, that those whose duty it is to be lights and guides in the world, and who are "set for the defence of the Gospel," ought to be vigilant in discerning, wise in understanding and appreciating, and faithful in exhibiting for the benefit of all around them, the serious dangers to which they are manifestly exposed?

Let none say, that "Romanism" has been greatly meliorated in modern times; and that many of the charges which were justly brought against that system in former ages, can no longer be with propriety imputed to it, as it now stands. We are aware, indeed, that some deluded people consider modern Popery as a very different, and a much more harmless thing, when compared with Popery as it appeared at the time of the Reformation, or as it has been seen in some parts of the world where it bore sovereign and universal sway. They judge of it as it appears in some amiable and respectable families and individuals of that denomination in the United States; and hastily conclude, that, whatever it might have been once, it is now a superstition indeed, but a very innocent one. But this is an utter delusion. Indeed, Papists themselves will not recognise as just, this over-kind and liberal concession in their favour. They will not admit that their religion has undergone the least change in any point whatever. It has always and every where been, they tell us, the same mild, parental, affectionate thing which it appears in New-York, Philadelphia, Baltimore, or the Western Country: and all the representations to the contrary, which have been so frequently reiterated, they confidently pronounce the vilest forgeries and calumny. Let no man be the dupe of such misrepresentation. It is all a deception. "Romanism" is the very same now that it was. So far they are right. But it is not that mild and inoffensive thing which its advocates allege it to be. It has not undergone, in this respect, the smallest mitigation or improvement. In

this country indeed, where it has no civil establishment, and where those who belong to its communion form a very small minority, it is mild, plausible, and insinuating; and would make us believe that there is no portion of professing Christians so abundantly and laboriously benevolent. And, accordingly, some of their most revolting habits and practises of penance, of superstitious ceremony, and of licentious indulgence, are never exhibited among us. Papists in the midst of such a Protestant population as that which surrounds them on this side of the Atlantic, cannot possibly carry into execution their system in all the ostentatious grossness, in all the unbridled profligacy under which it appears in countries where it holds an undisputed reign. It is here restrained, trammelled, and obliged by circumstances to be reserved and decent. The light which shines around its votaries is too bright for many of their worst works of darkBut go to those countries in which it still reigns in all its gloomy despotism; where it wields the sword; and where the human mind is as much enslaved by it as ever. Go to Italy, and especially to Spain and Portugal, and contemplate Romanism as it appears there at this hour; and then ask, whether it has not, in substance, the same essential characteristics;-the same corrupt and revolting aspect, which it manifested three hundred years ago?

ness.

The fact is, as long as the Romish Church continues to maintain the infallibility of the Pope, and his right to pronounce, without appeal, even to the Scriptures, what is the will of Christ;-as long as she maintains works of supererogation, and what is closely connected with them, the doctrine of merits and indulgences;-as long as she represents heaven as a part of the domain of St. Peter, so to speak, to be parcelled out, and made over to men for money, just as the avarice or caprice of the sovereign Pontiff, and his em issaries may dictate ;--as long as she maintains Transub. stantiation, that enormous outrage on every dictate of sense and reason, as well as of Scripture :-as long as she requires

her system of auricular confession, penance, the celibacy of the clergy, with all its appalling abuses, the worship of images, and prayers to the saints, and for the dead;-especially as long as she mutilates one of Christ's sacraments, and adds five more to the list which he never appointed ;-as long as she locks up the Scriptures from the common people, and exercises a spiritual tyranny over the consciences, as well as the lives and property of men-" binding heavy burdens and grievous to be borne, and laying them on men's shoulders, while she herself will not touch those burdens with one of her fingers ;"-as long, in fine, as she professes in words to hold all the leading doctrines of the Gospel, but, at the same time, makes them all totally void by her traditions ;--as long as she continues to maintain and require these things;-she may smile, and flatter, and disavow, and cajole, as she has always done;-but she cannot cease to be "Antichrist,""Babylon the great,"-" the mother of Harlots and abominations." The Church of Rome, in her innate essential character, is an intolerant persecuting Church. Her radical principles constrain her as far as possible, to prohibit the existence of any and other Church. She every dered prudent by necessity, and even timid by danger ;-but her nature must be entirely changed, before she can cease to deceive, cheat, oppress and destroy the children of men, under the pretext of making them happy here and hereafter.

may

be ren

It may be said, indeed, that those who are captivated by such a corrupt church, and consent to join it, cannot have any real religion; and that their becoming Papists, will not add to their danger, or make their situation, in any respect, worse than it is. This, however, is an entirely erroneous view of the subject. As long as a man entertains a tolerably correct theory on the subject of religion, and habitually comes within the reach of pure ministrations, there is surely more hope of him, than when he gives himself up to radical

error, and retreats out of the reach of all the ordinary means of light and warning. But, further, even supposing that graceless men, by becoming Papists, do not become in a worse situation with regard to their state towards God, or their prospects for eternity; may they not be made by the change, worse members of society; more unsound in all their practical principles, and more dangerous neighbours ?* Every addition that is made to the members of that corrupt

*We are far from alleging or thinking, that all Roman Catholics are less moral than the mass of their Protestant neighbours. We are aware that they furnish many examples of unexceptionable, and even ornamental deportment. But we cannot for a moment doubt that the natural tendency of the Popish doctrines of Absolution, Indulgences, &c., as we know they have been, and still are understood and acted upon, by millions of that denomination, is highly immoral. We should not expect to find any man who entered fully into the popular sense and use of those doctrines, worthy of confidence in any of the relations of life. Accordingly, the ingenious and learned M. Villers, author of an "Essay on the Influence of the Reformation by Luther,” to which a prize was awarded by the National Institute of France, a few years ago, expresses himself thus-" It is a certain fact that more crimes are committed in Catholic than in Protestant countries. I might instance many facts which I have collected on this subject. I will be satisfied with foreign authorities. Cit. Rebmann, President of the special tribunal of Mayence, in his Coup-d'œil sur l'elat des quatres departmens du Rhin, says that the number of malefactors in the Catholic and Protestant cantons, is in the proportion of four, if not six to one. At Augsburgh, the territory of which offers a mixture of the two religions, of nine hundred and forty-six malefactors, convicted in the course of ten years, there were only one hundred and eightyfour Protestants, that is to say, less than one in five. The celebrated philanthropist Howard, observed that the prisons of Italy were incessantly crowded. At Venice, he had seen three or four hundred prisoners in the principal prison. At Naples nine hundred and eighty in the succursal prison alone, called vacaria; while he affirms that the prisons of Berne are almost always empty; that in those of Lausanne he did not find any prisoner; and only three individuals in a state of arrest at Schaffhausen. [Here are facts; I do not draw any

conclusion." Villers, 8vo. 213.