by whom, therefore, as married priests, sacraments are celebrated and confessions are heard without the slightest animadversion. And it is well known that Pius VII. had instructed Consalvi, in arranging the Concordat with the French Government, to permit, on the part of the Papal See, the marriage of the French clergy, and the permission was only not granted because the Government thought it more prudent not to insist upon it.

(4) Again, no question is more important in the education of the Church than the withdrawal or concession of liberty to read freely the general literature of the times. On the greatest of all books, the Bible, a startling variety of opinion has prevailed in the Roman Church. In early times, the very name of the authorised translation of the Bible, the Vulgate,' implies, what was certainly the fact, that the Scriptures of the Old and New Testament were freely used in the vernacular languages. Nor has the use been forbidden entirely in modern times. But the precautions and the difficulties thrown in the way of such reading are such as to have produced one of the profoundest differences between the literature of the exclusively Catholic and the exclusively Protestant countries. One or other of the two principles must be right. But in the Roman Church both have prevailed at different times and in different countries. In the case of more general literature, the modern Roman Church has pronounced, with a severity which at first sight would appear to admit of no exception. It is illustrated by a case which recently occurred in Canada. A French Catholic Canadian was excommunicated during his lifetime, and after his death refused Christian burial, on the ground that he belonged to an institution which contained in its library books condemned by the Roman Index. For seven years his body was kept above ground, while his widow pursued from Court to Court her determination to have this censure mitigated. The case arrived, finally, before the English Privy Council, and was there decided in favour of burying the remains of the excommunicated man; chiefly on the ground that, inasmuch as the Decrees of Trent had not been promulgated in the Kingdom of France at the time of the annexation of Canada to the English Crown, they could not be understood to have any validity in the Canadian Dominion. The Roman Church itself, however, remained inflexible; and, although the body was buried in the great cemetery of Montreal under an escort of Canadian troops, the Roman clergy went afterwards through the ceremony of desecrating the grave, and the civil authorities were obliged to place upon it an enormous stone, still to be seen, in order

The case was referred by the ecclesiastical authorities of Canada to the Holy Office at Rome, and the decree (sanctioned by the Pope) on which the excommunication of Guibord was founded is as follows:- Itaque nemo cujuscumque gradus et conditionis prædictæ opera damnata atque proscripta, quocumque loco, et quocumque idiomate, aut in posterum edere, aut edita legere vel retinere audeat, sed locorum ordinariis, aut hæreticæ pravitatis Inquisitoribus ea tradere teneatur, sub pœnis in Indice librorum vetitorum indictis.' (Judgment of the Judicial Committee of the

to prevent the ecclesiastical authorities from carrying away the body by stealth. Such a display of ecclesiastical discipline might be supposed to carry with it a universal force, at least among all devout members of the Roman Church. But this is far from the case. The very same offence, which on a Canadian bookseller was visited with such tremendous penalties, is perpetrated constantly in London by distinguished members of the Roman Church, who may often be seen in the Athenæum Club, which possesses on its shelves books of the very same nature as those which, in the Canadian Institute, provoked the excommunication levelled against Joseph Guibord; and, if any of those eminent persons were to die as members of the Athenæum Club, they could not be buried in consecrated ground consistently with the doctrine of the Papal Court, as expressed in the excommunication of Guibord, and the desecration of his grave, unless by the merciful indulgence of the English Privy Council, which would no doubt take the same ground as in the more humble example at Montreal, namely, that the Decrees of Trent have never been formally promulgated within the realm of England. Such an inconsistency of practice and theory, if it were found in the English or Scottish Church, would no doubt excite a boundless derision and invective amongst members or admirers of the Roman Communion. In the Roman Communion it is often overlooked alike by its friends and its enemies.

(5) Another line of variation, partly practical and partly doctrinal, is to be found in the numerous Bulls, decrees, and treatises issued by Popes, councils, and casuists, maintaining the reality of witchcraft and the unlawfulness of usury. The belief on which those authoritative utterances were founded has been so completely abandoned in the Roman Church, that in this respect there is no difference between the practice and opinion of most Roman Catholics and that of enlightened Protestants.

(6) One of the points of which most complaint is heard against Protestant Churches is their want of discipline. But in the Roman Church the discipline is not only lax, but varies in the most marked diversity according to nationalities. It is, for example, of considerable importance to the social standard of the community whether the profession of actors is to be encouraged or condemned. Even in Protestant Churches there is a vast variety of judgment. But in the Roman Communion there is much deeper and wider disagreement. In the French Church they are, or were till recently, excommunicated and were denied the rites of Christian burial. In the Italian Church

they have all the privileges of the faithful. On this vast divergence the central authority of the Roman Church has pronounced no decision.

(7) The question of the endless torments of the wicked is one

'Cette excommunication a atteint M. Guibord par le fait même qu'il était

which cries for a solution. There is a terrible description of these torments and their incessant and interminable duration in a work by a Roman Catholic priest, the Rev. J. Furniss, written as if by an eyewitness, and published with the authoritative permission of his superiors. No book like that of Dr. Furniss would be allowed to circulate in the English Church with the sanction of its prelates, especially after the decision of the Supreme Court that the duration of future punishment is an open question. Nothing could justify such a publication except the most absolute certainty on the subject. But so far from there being any such certainty in the Roman Church, we find the utmost divergence. Not only are there expressions of a totally different character in Tertullian, Origen, St. Gregory of Nyssa, St. Gregory of Nazianzus, St. Ambrose-the three last recognised by the Roman Church as canonised saints-but even in modern times a brief but significant hint is dropped in a footnote to a wellknown work by the foremost theologian of that Church, that the Catholic Church has never ruled anything at all on the subject.

(8) Or, again, take the subject of missions to the heathen. No question can be more important than that which lies at the very threshold of missionary enterprise: from what to what is the conversion to take place? That is to say, how much of the old heathenism may be left?-how much of the new Christianity is to be adopted? The question has not been solved in Protestant Churches. But neither has it been solved in the Roman Church. Witness the long struggle, not yet determined, between the Popes 10 and the Jesuit missionaries in India and China on the qualifications which are or are not to be required from converts.

(9) Or, again, take the doctrine which in these later days has been represented as the crowning test of the fidelity of Roman Catholics to the see of Rome-the recent dogma of the Pope's Infallibility. On this dogma it is not too much to say that a wider divergence exists amongst the members of the Roman Church than on any single doctrine professed by any of the Protestant Churches. It is not merely that different shades of opinion exist amongst professing members of the Roman Communion on this subject such as are found in Protestant Churches on the subject of the doctrine of the Trinity or of Justification, but the Roman Communion includes, on the question of the Pope's authority, opinions which, on the one hand, regard him to be an impersonation of divine wisdom, and on the other a fallible mortal, with even less chance of arriving at truth than most of his fellow-creatures.

Compare the language of the Spanish or French prelates who promoted the dogmas of the Vatican Council with the language of

De hâc damnatorum saltem hominum respiratione nihil adhuc certè decretum est ab Ecclesia Catholicâ.'-Petavius, De Angelis (quoted in Cardinal Newman's Grammar of Assent, p. 417).

the Irish Roman Catholic prelates who, in answer to the question, 'What is Papal Infallibility?' caused the catechumen to reply 'It is a Protestant calumny.' Compare the almost adoring language held by extreme Ultramontanes respecting Pius IX., with the latest utterances of Montalembert, who spoke of him as the idol in the Vatican;' or with the contemptuous style in which the whole subject was treated by the distinguished Catholic laymen who, for a short time, ventured to express their opinions in the public journals of England. Compare the language of the two highest Roman authorities in England. One of them supported with all his energy the promulgation of the dogma, and afterwards spoke of its importance and its force in the most unqualified terms. The other regarded the formation of the dogma as the work of 'an aggressive insolent faction which,' as a student, he could not defend in the face of the facts of history;' and, even after accepting it, he reduced his allegiance to the very minimum of which human language is capable. Or, again, consider the assertions of those members of the Roman Communion who declare that they have acquiesced in this dogma, to their co-religionists so important, only on the understanding that as no Pope from the beginning of time ever has spoken authoritatively, so it is probable that no Pope to the end of time will ever so speak; or, as another alternative, that the moment any Pope falls into error, that moment ipso facto be ceases to be a Pope, and, therefore, ceases to speak as an authority. And to these variations amongst theologians we ought to add those still wider divergences which exist amongst the large classes of the Roman Communion, whose numbers form a material element in the dazzling pretensions which it puts forth; and yet of whom it is not too much to say that, both amongst the educated and uneducated classes, there are thousands to whom the Pope's claims to infallibility are entirely inoperative. It might perhaps be asked whether, even amongst the strongest upholders of the dogma, anyone ever quotes or accepts it except on behalf of something to which he is previously inclined. For all other cases, the qualifications in reserve are so large and numerous as to supply some means of escape.

(10) There is one final example, perhaps in some respects the most striking of all-the various types of character which the Roman Church has included. Unity of character, after all, is the essential sign by which the unity of a Church can be known. If any society is absolutely uniform in itself, the moral and mental character of its members will be absolutely alike also. This uniformity has been to a large extent attained in some of the Protestant Churches. There is a family sameness in all members of the Society of Friends, and in most members of the Scottish Free Church, which we vainly seek either in the Church of Rome or the Church of England. In the Church of Rome this diversity may be said to be of two kinds. There is first the diversity of extreme depravity and extreme goodness, and

"Letter to Cardinal Manning, by Mr. Maskell.

this amongst not merely private personages, but high officials-not merely amongst lax adherents, but devoted members. The infamous Cardinal Dubois was a more august representative of his Church, as far as authority and dignity were concerned, than the devout Fénelon or the excellent Massillon. The cruel Louis XI. and the profligate Louis XV. were as ardent followers of the Roman See as the saintly Louis IX. and the pure and tolerant Louis XVI. Again there is the diversity which may be yet more within the reach of modern experience, and which is found not only in the extremes of virtue and vice, but in the more complex shades of character, which nevertheless go far to divide and bewilder men's minds in the selection of Churches. There may be those members or converts of the Roman Communion who are absorbed in the intrigues, the trivialities, the proselytism which form so large a part of the occupation of the inferior spirits of the religious world in all Churches. There are also those members, and even converts, who avoid these pursuits with the utmost distaste, who live in that higher region of faith and charity which is common to the just spirits of all Churches-of these it may truly be said that they are Roman by accident, Catholic 12 by nature, and Christians by the grace of God. Let the Roman Church have both the advantage and the disadvantage of these fundamental divergences.

III. These are some of the examples of the variations of the Roman Church. We might indefinitely extend them. The position of the Virgin Mary in devotion, as represented by St. Alphonso Liguori on the one hand, or Cardinal Newman on the other hand; the profound credit, or absolute discredit, attached to La Salette or Lourdes; the elevation or depression of this or that local saint in the celestial hierarchy; the various opinions implied or expressed on the efficacy of indulgences. It may be asked why, if they are so palpable, they have not produced a greater effect, either in deterring the leaders of Roman proselytism from appeals to a unity so obviously fallacious, or in opening the eyes of those for the sake of whom those appeals are made to their illusory character? There may be several answers to this question; but one is sufficient. It is that the Roman Church has, in its later years, possessed the power which in the Middle Ages it had not yet acquired, of silencing, suppressing, and disguising the true expressions of the discontent and discordance of its members. That in this power so exercised there is something calculated to impress the imagination we do not deny-that all Churches are naturally eager to suppress the traces of discord and quarrel. Nevertheless to high-minded men it would appear of all ecclesiastical privileges one of the least enviable.

The conclusions which we would therefore draw are those which we stated at the beginning. The Roman Church is a vast institution, which, by the very reason of its antiquity, in its earlier history con

12 We here use this word in the original and true sense of 'universal,' 'compre