Thornton, commenced their attack, and immediately carried the battery to which they were opposed, and which had been the cause of much uneasiness to us during our preparation for the battle. This success made it an operation of no difficulty to enfilade the enemy's position on the left bank; and although allowing to our enemy on that bank all the valour they have a high claim to, it would have been exacting from them too great a degree of devotedness to believe, that they would have maintained themselves on a position in which their whole right wing could have been beaten down by a flank fire of cannon and grape shot. The reserve, composed of the flower of the army, had sustained no loss; the regiments composing the right wing could have been in a short time again brought forward; and the Black Corps were entire; but in the fall of the accomplished soldier who com Hull Citadel, July 17, 1828. LORETTO. In our controversies with Popery, one of the chief difficulties is to force an acknowledgment of its actual tenets. If we charge the Popish priest with idolatry, he turns round and denies all worship of idols. The stocks and stones before which he kneels, to which he offers prayers, and which in return cure his congregation of all kinds of ills, from the stoppage of a pestilence to the mending of a fractured shoe, are no idols with him, are mere representatives of something else, and serve no higher purpose than assisting the imagination. If we charge him with the grossness instilled into the minds of women and children, by the questions of the confessional, with its encouragement of crime by the scandalous facility of a monthly absolution for the most hideous enormities, and the aggravation of this guilty facility by the scandal of its universal sale; or if we stigmatize the heinous offence to the Majesty of the One God, to the whole spirit of Christianity, and the whole salvation of mankind, implied in the worship of the Virgin and the Saints, as sha rers in the Divine honours, as fellowmediators with the Author of our faith, and to be relied on for ensuring to man the hope of future happiness,they unhesitatingly tell us, that we have mistaken their doctrine; that if such were the tenets of a remote age, they are long since abandoned; and that to judge of their religion by this Having remained during the whole day in the American field hospital, I had an opportunity of observing the consternation caused to the enemy by Colonel Thornton's attack on the opposite bank, which was totally unexpected, and, in the British shout of victory, I anticipated a speedy release from captivity. It cannot be but proper to express gratitude for the courteous civility of General Jackson, who, on causing a staff officer to express regret for the misfortune which had made me a prisoner, begged my acceptance of a bottle of choice claret, rendered at that time, in consequence of the British blockade, of rare value in that part of America. + Having been withdrawn from the Mississippi, detachments from regiments composing the right wing distinguished themselves in the capture of the battery commanding the entrance of Mobile Bay. There are always opportunities by which a knowledge of the defences of a regular fortress can be obtained; but at New Orleans the works had been only just constructed, and the vigilance of the enemy rendered it perfectly impossible to reconnoitre the ditch; had its dimensions been known to the soldiery, the star of the American general would not on that day have shone with such splendour. its present practice, would shew it clear from all obnoxious points, and a model of simplicity, truth, and Christianity! Now, let Popery be thus tried, and the question of its impurity, wretched spirit of popular imposition, and gross idolatry, will be settled at once. But we must look to it, not as it exists in our heretical land, where a vigilant eye is kept upon its proceedings, and where it does not disgust the nation by the open exhibition of its perform ances; but let us take it in Italy, under the sunshine of the Fopedom, unclouded by the invidiousness of rival faiths, and flourishing in the full luxuriance of the triumphant religion. We may hereafter look to other displays of the Popedom; but for the present we shall content ourselves with one, the “ Holy House" of Loretto: A miracle, or succession of miracles, solemnly vouched for by the whole circles of the Romish Church, pressed upon the consciences of all Popish Europe, the centre of worship for ages to immense multitudes, from sovereign princes down to peasants, and to this hour upheld in all its honours, human and divine, by the High Priest and Monarch of the Popish world. The narrative shall not be given from our lips, but from those of the Romish priesthood, word for word, formally authorized, and published for the wisdom of all who are to be sanctified by the sight of "our Lady of Loretto." It is the literal translation of the Guide-book, sold at Loretto, and with the features of the shrine, giving an "Abrégé Historique des translations prodigieuses le la Sainte Maison," from the Italian, written by Monsieur Murri, the Curé, or Rector, of Loretto. The little volume is dedicated to a high authority, Lemarrois, the Governor-General of the three adjoining departments under Napoleon, and printed at Loretto in 1809! The preface of the translator Philippe Pagès, a French monk, thus suitably opens the history of the great Romish miracle. "With the most lively interest I translate into my native tongue the Italian narrative of the Holy House. My countrymen, everywhere lovers of the beautiful and the true, will feel indebted to me for introducing to their language a narrative as interesting as it is miraculous. Profane historians have gloried in transmitting to poste rity facts infinitely less important than the wonderful travels of the Santa Casa! "If in any corner of the universe there were to be seen a spot which had served as the asylum of a celestial spirit, the most thoughtless and coldhearted of human beings would undertake long journeys to visit it; and the most incurious readers would, once at least in their lives, desire to read the volume which detailed its circumstances in perfect sincerity and in truth. With how much eagerness then, with what sacred enthusiasm, must they not desire to read the nar rative, at once ingenuous, simple, sincere, and elegant, which M. Murri has given of the humble dwelling which served as the retreat of the So vereign Master of the world! "The Divine and Omnipotent Architect might doubtless have built for himself a second heaven, and used it as his dwelling; but as he became man only to teach us a humility till then unknown, he was pleased to be born in a spot the most abject and common, to condemn the pride of man. "But I am wrong-this spot is neither abject nor common. It has been, on the contrary, almost made divine by the indwelling, by the presence of a God hidden under the human form ; and for those five centuries, it has be come, by a just right, the point of veneration to the Catholic world." Here commences the narrative of the Curé of Loretto: "The town of Nazareth, seated on the slope of a hill in the vicinage of Mount Tabor, was one of the principal places of the province of Galilee, before the Roman conquest. But the just wrath of Heaven having given up the guilty nation to the scourge of war, pestilence, and famine, and to a ruin which will end only with the world, Nazareth shared the general lot; and at the time of St Jerome, it was no more than a wretched village. "The zeal of the primitive Christians vainly strove to restore it in some degree to its ancient lustre, by making it the seat of a Bishop. But the last of its pastors having shamefully apostatized, the town fell into the decay in which we see it still, a miserable collection of huts, and refuge for the robbers of Arabia. "But neither the ravages of time, nor the violence of arms, could rob Nazareth of the glory of having been the country of the most august Virgin, the mother of God! and of having enclosed within its circuit the house in which she was born, where the great mystery of the Incarnation took place, and where our Lord lived the greater part of his mortal existence, that is till his baptism. This is the house, which, by the ministry of angels, was, after a lapse of so many years, transported among us, and which now makes the glory of Italy, and the most sensible and beloved honour of our province. In the seventy-first year of the Christian era, Nazareth was sacked and ruined by the Romans. But the Deity watched with an eye of care and affection over the dwelling of Mary, not suffering the enemy to penetrate to the place in which it stood, and where it continued concealed until the moment fixed on in the divine councils, for bringing it to light, for the veneration of all the world. "An event of this kind happened first under the government of Constantine the Great. About the year 307, the Empress Helena, his mother, made a pilgrimage to the holy places of Palestine. She first visited the manger where our Lord had lain; then Calvary, the Holy Sepulchre, and Nazareth, the place where our redemption had its origin, and the only place where she found no mark of profanation. The royal pilgrim found the holy dwelling under a heap of ruins. After having paid it her veneration, she resolved to attempt no change in it. She only reared again the altar on which the holy Apostles had offered the divine sacrifice! "But she directed the Imperial Ministers to build over and round the Holy House an august and magnificent temple, on whose marble front she engraved the brief but expressive inscription: Hæc est ara in qua primo jactum est hu. manæ salutis fundamentum.'" "The report of this building was spread through the world, and from that time, the nations were eager to make pilgrimages to venerate the house of the Queen of the Angels. Kings, princes, and others, not less distinguished for their rank than for their holiness, came to visit this heaven upon earth! "In the year 1245, Palestine had to tally fallen under the Saracens. Saint Louis, touched with the desire to con quer this chosen land, embarked with a powerful army, and landed successfully in Egypt. But pestilence resisted his great designs. The multitude of the French warriors perished, and finally the king was made prisoner; God permitting that a war underta ken with motives so rational and so holy, should come to so disastrous an end, because the time fixed in the divine councils for the deliverance of Palestine was not yet come. "Saint Louis, having been set at liberty by a capitulation, reached Nazareth in 1252, where, on the 25th of March, the day of the Annunciation, he went on foot, covered with a penitential robe, from Mount Tabor, to venerate the adorable chamber of Mary, and where, having heard mass,he communicated. He then returned to the temple which covered the Holy House, and ordered Odo, Bishop of Frascati, the Legate of the Papal See, to perform mass upon the High Altar." The narrative now proceeds to state that a memorial of those ceremonies remains in some very old paintings on the western wall of the sanctuary; that the existence of the Holy House' was unquestionable, until the close of the thirteenth century, when the Caliphs conquered Galilee, with the slaughtering of 20,000 Christians and the slavery of 200,000. The Mahometans pulled down the temple of Helena; and the Holy House was lost to mankind for ever but for "the admirable and incomprehensible wisdom, which, to save the house of the divine Mother, snatched it from its founda tions by the most surprising and unheard-of miracle; the foundations still remaining in proof visibly at Nazareth." It is obvious that the miracle would never have been wrought, could the monks of Nazareth receive pilgrims as of old. But the Mahometan hand, by at once pulling down the Temple and routing the monks, gave the Santa Casa the opportunity of flying away, (which of course it never could have done, with a huge Roman building over it,) and put an end to all the attempts which the monks on that spot would have made to hold it fast to the ground, while it could produce them a ducat. The house now feeling itself without use in a land of misbelievers, without the impediment of a colossal roof of lead and stone above its head, and without a single monk to battle against the angelic carriers, bade farewell to the humiliated soil of Palestine, and steered for the land of Romish virtue. "The miraculous translation from Nazareth to the borders of Dalmatia occurred on the 10th of May, A. D. 1291, in the pontificate of Nicholas IV. It alighted on a low hill between the town of Tersata and Fiume, where neither house nor hut had ever been seen before. "A multitude of the Dalmatians ran together to the place on hearing of the prodigy; and after having observed the Holy House placed without foundation or support on an uneven ground; after having also observed that it was of the most ancient construction, and that its masonry shewed it to be not of their own country, but of a distant land-they entered, and were still more astonished to find the House roofed and wainscotted, the wainscot being covered with blue, and divided into little squares scattered with golden stars. Two fragments of this decoration are yet to be seen. "They perceived, besides, a little altar attached to the wall opposite the door; and upon the altar they found an ancient Greek cross of wood, with a figure of the crucifix painted on the cloths which covered the cross, and also found a statue of the Most Holy Virgin holding in her arms the infant Jesus. At the left of the door was a little cupboard hollowed in the wall, and near it the place of an ancient hearth, in the style of Nazareth, that is, without an orifice for the smoke, inasmuch as in the East they use only charcoal. "But that the people of the town of Tersata should learn the origin and value of this house, the Mother of God was pleased to add to this extraordinary event a new miracle." Alexandre de George, Curé of Tersata, being dangerously ill, the Holy Virgin appeared to him in a dream, and revealing that the house which had lately arrived in the country by a prodigy which none could explain, was the true House of Nazareth, in proof of her appearing, restored him at the instant to complete health. Mr Curé awoke, found himself perfectly well, got out of his bed, and, full of joy, flew to the holy chapel to thank his divine benefactress. "The people of Tersata, now irresistibly convinced of their good fortune, with one accord implored per mission of the Chevalier Nicholas Frangipani, then governor of the province, to send four of their fellowcitizens to Nazareth, to make themselves still surer of so great a prodigy." T The narrative proceeds to say, that the governor sent the deputies with four of his own, carrying the exact measurement of the Santa Casa, that they might compare it with the original site. Nothing could be more satisfactory than the result. The deputies found that not a fragment of the house remained further than the precise quantity which might assist to realize the evidence of the removal. The length and breadth, the stones, &c. &c. were the same, and the fame of the miracle redounded in the shape of donations from all sides. Frangipani was not asleep to the advantages of having such an attraction for the opulent and pious, within his grasp; and, as the narrative says, "he had formed vast projects to second the devotion of the faithful, and to increase, if possible, the reputation of the holy place," when suddenly the Santa Casa chose a more civilized spot than the savage borders of Dalmatia. "At once," says the Curé, "after three years and seven months from its memorable translation to Tersata, the Santa Casa was seen to rise into the air again, and pass over the Adriatic! It descended in the centre of a thick forest, at a short distance from the fortunate hill where it now stands, and where all Christendom comes to do it homage. "The tenth of December, A.D. 1294, in the pontificate of Celestine the V., was the memorable epoch of an event so prodigious. About ten o'clock of the night before, the sacred dwelling appeared in the neighbourhood of the town of Recanati, and came to the ground in the midst of a forest called the Laurel Wood, about two leagues off. "Man was wrapped in sleep at the moment when this wonderful translation occurred. The shepherds who were as usual watching their sheep, were the first to have the happiness of seeing this holy asylum. An extraor dinary light, which shone in its direc tion, induced them to come and see the cause. They saw with astonishment that the light proceeded from an ancient house, which they now observed for the first time, and in a place where there had been no dwelling before. "While the crowd gathered from all sides to see the wonder, and were reasoning on it with each other, an individual made his appearance, who declared that he had seen the House carried through the air, just as it arrived on the neighbouring shore of the Adriatic. At length, encouraging each other, they ventured to enter, rightly conceiving that the House must contain something surprising and divine. Finally, they were convinced, and spent the remainder of the night round the holy place. At daybreak, they hurried into the town to tell their masters what they had seen." Their masters were at first incredulous, but they visited the wood, and were, of course, convinced. But, to make conviction surer still, a miracle was wrought. "The Holy Virgin appeared at the same time to two of her faithful servants in the neighbourhood of Loretto, and told them both that the house was her dwelling at Nazareth, transported by angels, to give all Christendom, by so august a present, a powerful succour, and a sure refuge in its most pressing needs. The first who had this miraculous vision, was Saint Nicholas of Tolentino, one of the greatest saints of the order of Saint Augustine, residing at Recanati. The other was the Brother Paul, who had fixed his hermitage on the summit of a hill a little further; now called Montorso. "The rumour of the miracle now spread far and wide, and nothing was heard of but the forest of Loretto and the Santa Casa of Nazareth. Day and night the highways were crowded with pilgrims of all ranks and ages, to see the holy chamber, and offer their tribute of homage and veneration. "But the Enemy of Man, indignant at seeing so great a work wrought against him, made every effort to destroy the devotion of the faithful. The sanctuary stood in the centre of a forest, about half a league from the sea, and the ways to it were narrow, and choked up with thickets and thorns. Men without morality or religion, and with no object but gold, formed themselves into bands, and robbed the pilgrims." The pilgrimages were of course soon thinned; and the profits of the shrine went down. The VOL. XXIV. Virgin found that she had chosen a bad position, and she was not above acknowledging her error. "In fact," says the Curé, "eight months after the first arrival, the Santa Casa found itself again placed on the top of a fine hill above Recanati, and a mile from its former site. The new ground belonged to two brothers, who, rejoicing in the precious gift of Heaven, paid it all the highest homage." But the Virgin had now made a second mistake. The brothers, shortly seeing that the Santa Casa was likely to be a mine to the possessor, quarrelled about the possession, and "a vile desire of enriching themselves at the expense of the holy altar" taking place of their piety, they were about to cut each other's throats. The Virgin had now to prevent the fratricide, and much more the robbery; and it was done without delay. 66 The Most High, who abhorred the rage of fraternal quarrels as much as the murders of the forest, transported the house of his Divine Mother out of the grounds of those brothers, and placed it on another fine hill, a musket-shot from the former, and in the middle of the high-road to the part of Recanati, where it stands to this day." Further locomotion seemed now unnecessary; but the people of Recanati, not knowing what opinion the holy Virgin might have on the subject, and feeling the advantages of the pilgrim purse, determined that the house should stay where it was. They accordingly adopted the expedient found so satisfactory by the Empress Helena. They built another house over it, loaded with a weight of marble enough to defy the flying propensities of any house in Christendom; and the experiment has succeeded. The altar stands where it did; and what is not less important, it is still frequented; and though the contributions may not flow in with the original rapidity, the shrine is well worth taking care of, and works miracles in abundance-cures the sick, the dying, and the dead-and flourishes as an irresistible evidence of the purity and truth of Popery, sanctioned by the honours of Popes, the worship of Italy, and the presents of the Popish world to this hour. 27 |