PRIESTLY CELIBACY

EXPOSED

A LECTURE

—BY—

THE REV. GEO. TOWNSEND FOX, D. D

OF DURHAM, ENGLAND

REVISED AMERICAN EDITION

THE MENACE PUBLISHING COMPANY
AURORA, - - MISSOURI



Ooecfd!f!ed



Preface

A case of affiliation was lately brought before the magistrates
of Stockton, in which the complainant was the daughter of a

clergyman of the Church of England, a pervert to popery, and the

defendant was the Komish priest of that town. This case having

excited a great deal of attention, not only in the place where it

was tried, but in the North of England generally, I thought it a

suitable occasion to direct the attention of the inhabitants of

Stockton to the doctrine of the Church of Eome in reference to priest-

ly celibacy, and to let them see what results have always proceeded

from it.

During the last few years this country has been subjected to a

foreign invasion; Italian Jesuits and Maynooth priests have flocked

to our shores, for the purpose of carrying on missionary operations

amongst the population of England, as though all the inhabitants

of this country, except the handful of Eomanists amongst us, were

the natives of a heathen land. Still further, the Church of Eome has

arrogated spiritual authority over all baptized persons of this realm,

whom she would subject to the penalties of her ecclesiastical law,
had she the power to enforce it.

Since, then, Eome has seen fit to visit our shores in this double

capacity, as a missionary to win and as a ruler to command our

subjection, we are entitled to sift her claims, and to examine her

doctrines; and since the surest protection against the inroads of

Popery consists in knowing what it really is, I conceive it to be the

duty of every one who is attached to the principles of truth, to en-

deavor to inform the minds of the people, and to direct their atten-

tion to the teaching and practice of the Church of Eome, that they

may know what she is, and whereof she is made, so as to be able to
understand what they must look for, if ever they should succumb to

her power.

It is a great mistake, under which many persons labor, whose
knowledge of the genius and character of popery is superficial, to

regard it as simply a religious system. Popery has contrived so to

mix up political principles with religion so to dovetail the spiritual

and secular elements, that it is difficult to say which predominates;

and it throws the aegis of its protection over every aiggression on the

rights of mankind, by putting forth arrogant claims of divine right

and spiritual authority.

That system cannot be regarded as other than political which

has dethroned kings, governed provinces, disturbed the peace of the



4 PEEFACE

world, involved mankind in bloodshed, and enslaved not merely the

minds, but the bodies of men.

It is this peculiarity of popery which brings it into such fre-

quent conflict with the secular powers, and renders it so dangerous

to the political well-being of our country. As a system of religious

error, it is sufficiently deleterious in its influence over the human

mind, and requires the resistance of all who feel the value of re-

ligious truth; but as a political system, it is fraught with such

dangers to the welfare of the state, as to demand the most serious

attention and strenuous opposition of politicians.

Nothing can be more dangerous to the political safety of a

country than to introduce a spiritual power which wields its sceptre

over the conscience and feelings of mankind, for the purpose of

drawing off their affection from the political institutions under

which they dwell.

Yet such is the kind of influence which the pope of Eome would

exercise over the subjects of Great Britain. To give an individual

instance of this, he has thrown the halo of religion around the secu-

lar question of titles to Eomish priests in this country, and though

it has been declared by the law of the land to be an infringement

on the rights of our Queen, to give such titles to Eomish bishops, yet

such is the influence which the emissaries of the pope have exercised,

that everywhere you find his dictum preferred amongst Eoman Cath-
olics to the law of the land. It holds good in every department of

life, civil as well as religious, that no man can serve two masters;

and since the pope of Eome so involves political questions with re-

ligion as frequently to come into collison with the law of England,

they who have surrendered their allegiance to him cannot be true to

their attachment to the Queen or to the laws of Great Britain.

Of this the late trial, to which I have adverted, afforded a

striking instance; for on that occasion, before a bench of magis-

trates, the lawyer for the defendant addressed a Eomish priest by

the title of the Bishop of Hexham, though he acknowledged that

it was not lawful to do so. It would seem, therefore, that the pope^s

law was held superior to the Queen’s law in the presence of a mag-

isterial body in Stockton.

Politicians, who have the welfare of their country at heart,

would do well to ponder this peculiarity of popery, and realize how

great is the danger of dividing the allegiance of a people, and draw-

ing away their affections to a foreign power whose interests are

diametrically opposed to our own.

No man can serve two masters; and when the pope commands

his followers to do that which Queen Victoria and the law of the

land forbid, we know by experience which master the devoted servant

of Eome will obey.

There is something extremely humiliating to our national feel-

ing, that any Englishman should more regard the dictation of a

foreigner, pay more respect to the command of a wretched Italian



PEEFACE 5

priest, than to the will of our own Queen, or the majesty of English

law. But so it is; and where popery gains the ascendency over an

Englishman’s heart, it must, as it appears to me, loosen his attach-

ment to the institutions of his native land, and make him a bad

subject^ for no man can serve two masters.

Another important consideration, which may well induce those

to look about them who have to do with courts of justice, is the

doctrine which the Church of Eome holds on the subject of oaths.

A Eomish priest was called upon at the late trial to give evidence
upon a matter in which the credit of his order and the interest of

his Church were at stake. Now— after having carefully perused the
various sanctions which the Church of Eome has given to equivocate

and to swear falsely, and after considering the plenary absolution

she offers to her votaries committing such offenses—I must say that
I cannot attach the slightest weight to the testimony of a Eomish

priest given upon oath in a court of justice; and I leave it to any

one to say what is its value, when the following doctrines are un-

blushingly sanctioned by the Church of Eome:

‘‘To swear with equivocation when there is a just cause and

equivocation itself is lawful, is not evil; because where there is a

just cause for concealing the truth, and it is concealed without a lie,,

no detriment is done to an oath.

The following is the definition of “a just cause”:

“A just cause is any honest end in order to preserve good
things for the spirit or useful things for the body.”

“It is lawful to use equivocation and to confirm it with an

oath.
’ ’

“A confessor can affirm, even with an oath, that he does not
know a sin heard in confession, by understanding as a man, not as a

minister of Christ.”

“The accused, or a witness not properly interrogated, can swear
that he does not know a crime, which in reality he does know, by

understanding that he does not know the crime concerning which

legitimately he can be inquired of; or that he does not know it so

far as to give evidence concerning it.”

“A person who deceives by swearing with equivocation may be
absolved, because in such an oath, which cannot be called a perjury,

he has not sinned against commutative justice, but against legal

justice and due obedience to a judge whpse command of unfolding

the truth is transient, and only lasts while the judge interrogates.”

“The accused, if in danger of death, exile, loss of property,
and such like, can deny the crime even with an oath, by understand-

ing that he did not commit it so that he is bound to confess it.”,

The Church of Eome having seen fit thus to break down the
barriers of morality and truth, has no reason to complain if we



6 PEEFACE

should refuse to believe one word uttered by her bishops and priests

under oath in a witness box.

The foregoing quotations are from the. writings of the approved,

canonized, and invocated St. Liguori, which were discussed some

twenty times by the Sacred College; after which matured digestion

they received the formal sanction of the pope, and were put forth

to the world with this high encomium, that not one word worthy of

censure had been found in them.

Such are the morals for which we pay £30,000 per annum!



Priestly Celibacy Exposed

Mr. Chairman and Friends; The attention of the public has

lately been aroused by a case brought before the local magistrates,

which involved the moral character of a Eomish priest in this place;

so great is the notoriety it has gained, as to make it quite unneces-

sary for me to refer to it more particularly.

I have invited you to meet me this evening, not to discuss the

merits of that case, with which I desire to have nothing to do—

but to give you some information, on the general subject to whicn

it refers. Such is the apathy that it is only on special occasions like

the papal aggressions, or of local interest, like that to which I have

referred, that the attention of the public can be aroused to the sub-

ject of popery; and such is the ignorance wherein people for the

most part are content to remain respecting the dangerous and corrupt

principles of popery, that I conceive it a duty which I owe to

society, to seize any opportunity that presents itself of conveyng

information to the people. Such I regard the present, and it is

therefore that I have invited you to meet me this evening, that I
may lay before you the facts connected with one of the most re-

volting pages in the history of popery.

The subject which circumstances, not choice, have forced upon

me, is one of great delicacy, and to handle it becomingly before a

mixed audience, is a task of no small difficulty, for the details are

so revolting, and many of them so unfit for the public ear, that it is

difficult to produce the facts we possess, which form the strength of

every cause. We have to do with a sink of iniquity, the very stirring
of which excites pestilent miasma and poisonous fumes; but to

fathom its depths, or lay bare its most secret recesses, is a task I

dare not undertake; to attempt it would be safe neither for you nor

me. But on the other hand, it wiU not do in times like these, from

a feeling of false or overstrained delicacy, to abstain from making

known the doctrines and practice of the Church of Borne. If that

corrupt church were content to let us alone in England, we might

let her alone also; but since she has proclaimed aggression as the

order of the day, and claims to exercise spiritual dominion over

these realms, we must not, from a feeling of shame, shrink from
laying bare the secret corruptions of her teaching and practice.

It is necessary that the people of this realm should be informed

what she is, that the fair garb and gorgeous apparel, wherein she

appears clad before the eyes of the world, should be stripped off,



8 PRIESTLY CELIBACY EXPOSED

and her secret corruptions be exposed. We are constrained to deal
by her as Una, Spenser’s graceful emblem of female virtue, dealt by

Duenna, the counterpart of Rome:

“So as she bade that witch they disarrayed.
And robbed of royal robes and purple pall.
And ornaments that richly were displayed,
Ne spared they to strip her naked all.
Then when they had despoiled her tire and call.
Such as she was their eyes might her behold.
That her mis-shaped parts did them appall,
A loathy, wrinkled hag, ill-favored, old.
Whose secret filth good manners biddeth not be told.”

The subject, then, to which I invite your attention this even-

ing, is the Romish doctrine of the Celibacy of the Clergy, and the

immoral results which have proceeded from it.

The Church of Rome has broached a doctrine not to be found

in scripture. The Bible tells us, it is not good for man to be alone

—it further teaches us that marriage is honorable in aU, and lastly,

assures us that it is better to marry than to burn.

But Rome, in diametrical opposition to the Bible, declares that

it is far the best for man to be alone, that marriage is not honorable

in all, and that it is better a man should burn than marry.

Not content to put this out as a private opinion of her own,

she must endeavor to force it down the throats of all the world,

with the aid of her anathematizing piston or forcing pump, to which

the Doctors of Trent had so frequent recourse, curing all who dif-

fered from her, for want of better argument.

Thus the Council of Trent has decreed:

“Whoever shall afiS.rm that persons in holy orders may contract
marriage, and that the contract is valid, notwithstanding any ecclesi-

astical law or vow; and that all persons may marry, who feel that,
though they shoula make a vow of chastity, they have not the gift

thereof: let him be accursea.”

So much for the doctrine of Rome; the arguments by which it

is defended will claim our attention by and by.

But, first, I must give you a brief history of the rise and

progress of the doctrine of celibacy in the Church of Rome, and

trace its true parentage and origin.

One of the very first corruptions which insinuated itself into the

Church was an extravagant admiration of celibacy, which was ex-

tolled in unmeasured terms as the angelic or celestial virtue. But

the doctrine itself is of heathen origin, and it was from the super-

stitions of the “Gentiles” that the Christian Church first embraced

the false and foolish conceit that there was a peculiar and angelic

virtue in cexiDacy. From the Gentiles it spread amongst the Essenes,

a Jewish sect, whom Josephus tells us were advocates of Celibacy

—

from them it was embraced by the early “heretics,” the Montanists,

Marcionites, Manichees, and others—and just in proportion as the

purity of the Church decayed, it imbibed the unscriptural fashion



PEIESTLY CELIBACY EXPOSED 9

of the day, an ardent, senseless admiration for celibacy. Such is the

parentage of the doctrine—first, the “heathen,^’ then the Essenes,
then the “heretics,” and lastly, the decaying Church at large.

Clerical celibacy, however, was not the original form which the

madness assumed—it first ran its course amongst the people. An-
thony, in the fourth century, was the first who collected together

ascetics of either sex, who, renouncing intercourse with the world,

betook themselves to the deserts of Egypt; and so rapidly did this

new species of madness spread, that ere long the East swarmed with

persons who, abandoning the occupations and comforts of life, and

all intercourse with society, spent their lives in solitude and celibacy,

vainly dreaming that thereby they were doing God service.

But at this period, be it remembered, and for many centuries

after, the law of clerical celibacy did not exist. At various times

efforts were made to bring about this obnoxious rule of life, but

without success: the subject was mooted at the celebrated Council of

Nice, in the year 325; we read in the history of that council that

an effort was made to impose celibacy on the clergy by an express

law, but that it failed, for the aged Paphnutius, bishop in the

Upper Thebaid, himself the inmate of a monastery from boyhood,

opposed the motion, and it was lost.

Another epoch in the history of clerical celibacy, is the reign

of the celebrated pontiff, Gregory the Great, in the sixth century;

for though he was bent on the same object, and did, for a time,

deprive his clergy of their wives, and decree in favor of celibacy,

yet I shall show you by and by that the consequences of that decree

were so horrible as to compel this pope, dismayed by the direful

results, to repeal the law.

Various attempts were made at sundry times, by popes and

councils, to dishonor matrimony, and to deprive priests of their wives,

with which tedious and insipid details I shall not weary you; but

it was not till the reign of that arch tyrant, George VII., in the

eleventh century, that these iron shackles were riveted upon the

clergy—and he, notwithstanding his power, found it an almost im-
practicable task to deprive the priests of their wives.

The German clergy were the most sturdy opponents of ecclesi-

astical tyranny, for when Gregory, in the year 1074, enacted that

no priests should henceforth marry, and that such as now had wives

should relinquish either them or their sacred office, immediately, as

we read in history, horrible tumults were excited by the priests,

many of whom were willing rather to relinquish the priesthood than

to part with their wives; and many of them seceded from the Churcli

of Atome, branding the poptiff and his adherents with the odious

name of Paterini, i. e., Manichaeans.

The German clergy exclaimed they would rather lose their priest-

hood than part with their wives.
‘

‘ Let him who despises men, ’ ’ said

they,
‘

‘ see whence he can procure angels for the churches.
’ ’

The

clergy of. Passau, when the papal prohibition was published, said



10 PEIESTLY CELIBACY EXPOSED

to their bishop, “They neither could or would abandon the custom
which it was clear they had followed from ancient times.’’ Such

is the record of history.

We find that in the Jewish Church all the patriarchs, and proph-
ets, and priests, had the liberty to marry. Adam, Enoch, Abraham,

Isaac, and Jacob, Joseph, Aaron, Samuel, Isaiah, and others, were

all married. So distasteful to Romish ears was this fact, put forth

in the works of Chrysostom, that in his twenty-first homily on Gene-

sis, they have taken the liberty to expunge the words: “all the

prophets had wives
;

’ ’ and as the Belgian and Spanish Index have

so decreed it, of course the expurgation of this heretical comment

must be correct!

Notwithstanding this caveat, however, you will allow me to
remind you that Zacharias, the father of John the Baptist, was a

married priest. And now, coming to the times of Christianity^ we
find the Apostles themselves were married men

;
those leaders, those

founders of the Christian Church, did not despise the marriage bond,

did not think themselves too holy to lead about a wife. But, strangest

of all, mirabile dictu! Peter, that prince of the Apostles, had a

wife—O Peter! what wast thou about so to disigrace thy ministry?
Didst thou know no better than this? Surely thou must have been

ignorant of the princely perfection of the baccalaureate priesthood!

Surely thou hadst never dreamt of Hildebrand’s decree, or else thou

hadst put away thy wife when promoted to the ofiice of apostle!

No wonder, then, if Apostles had wives, that the inferior clergy
should have them, too, and that one of the requirements which

Timothy was to see to amongst the bishops or presbyters under his

charge, was that they be “the husband of one wife.”

The records of succeeding times I have already given, whereby

you have seen that, notwithstanding the mad fury and wild fanat-
icism of the East in favor of celibacy during the fourth century, no

law was put in permanent force to prevent the clergy from having

wives till that ambitious far-sighted prelate, Gregory the Seventh,

did, at all hazards, put a yoke upon the neck of the priesthood,

which neither their fathers nor they were able to bear.

Rome, notwithstanding her boasts of antiquity, cannot prove

an earlier date than 1074, when the Romish Church was sunk in

deepest corruption, and the world in blackest darkness, for the in-

stitution of her ecclesiastical edict, which sets at defiance the law

of nature.

We will not consider her defense of this monstrous act of tyranny
towards the priests that acknowledge her rule.

It is a debated point amongst Romish casuists whether the

celibacy of the clergy is enjoined by Scripture: for, notwithstanding

the access they have at all times to an infallible interpreter, there

is a vast deal of debatable ground in the Romish Church; and since

they have not settled the question for themselves, it is surely no great



PBIESTLY CELIBACY EXPOSED 11

liberty if we undertake to do so for them, or at least accept the

decision of such doctors as please us best.

BeUarmine, that celebrated doctor, confesses that
‘

‘ single life

is not imposed upon ministers by the law of God, for there is no

precept, either in the Old or New Testament, that forbiddeth minis-

ters to marry, but that it is a positive law of the Church, kept and

observed ever since the Apostles’ times, and therefore it is not now

lawful for ministers to marry.” (cap. xviii. lib. 1, de Clericis) ; and

Bailly writes thus: ^‘You inquire whether clergymen in sacred orders

are bound to observe perpetual continency by the divine or apostolicgj

law! It is answered with many theologians against certain others,

that the celibacy annexed to sacred orders was neither instituted nor

commanded by Christ, nor by the Apostles at his command.” Here,

certainly, is a most candid confession from the pen of a Eomish

doctor—a plain acknowledgment that the celibacy of the clergy is an

unscriptural doctrine. He proceeds: “Nothing is found in the Scrip-

ture or tradition by which it can be proved that perpetual continency

was imposed on ministers by Christ, or by the Apostles at his com-

mand. On the other hand the Church permitted for many ages to

the Greek priests the society of wives whom they had taken before
ordination, and still permits; but the Church is unable to dispense

with a law imposed by Christ, or by the Apostles at the command

of Christ; it may therefore be said that the law of perpetual con-
tinency imposed upon sacred ministers was introduced by the hier-

archy, or by the Apostles, as igovernors and leaders of the churches

who proposed it, not as a divine and immutable, but as an ecclesias-

tical law, as the best mode of governing the Church. For these rea-

sons it is manifest that the law of celibacy is at the same time

ecclesiastical and apostolical.”

Was there ever such a specimen of Jesuitical logic as this?
How does this skillful disputant make out his case? Why, much
as a fox hunter rides over the country, by jumping all the itches.

He has made a clear somersault over all the historical hiatus, and
has got to the end of his argument by clearing at one leap that

awkward dilemma presented by an entire absence of proof that ever

the Apostles, “as governors and leaders of the church, proposed

this law” in any sense whatever, either divine or ecclesiastical. So
far from it, they themselves married, sanctioned the marriage of

others, and Paul, though a celibate himself, vindicated his right and

title to a wife with as strenuous a zeal as if he had been a Prot-

estant. “Have we not power,” he exclaims, “to lead about a sister,
a wife, as well as other Apostles, and as the brethren of the Lord

and Cephas?” There are some of the doctors of Rome who are
very angry with us for translating this word a wife, and charge

us with willful perversion of Scripture. The case stands thus: the

original (gunaika) signifies a woman, but is constantly, in classical
use, employed to designate a wife, and you must be guided by the

context as to the natural meaning. Now I would ask you which is
the most likely, that Paul should claim his right and privilege to



12 PRIESTLY CELIBACY EXPOSED

lead a woman who was his wife, or a woman who was not? I am

not much surprised, however, that a Romish priest should be offended

at our translation, and that he should prefer the interpretation “an

unmarried woman’’; it would indeed, be a great thing to get Scrip-

ture and the practice of Paul to justify taking a young unmarried

female into a bachelor establishment and to prove that the great

Apostle of the Gentiles himself would have traveled with her by rail

from Stockton to Leeds! To make out this would, indeed, be worth

a trifle.

Such is the total absence of proof, either Scriptural, traditional,

or historical, that ever the celibacy of the clergy was a law of the

Church till the year of 1074.

Notwithstanding all objections, however, such is the position

which the Church of Rome has seen fit to take. She has, by a law

liKe that of the Medes and Persians, which changeth not, cut off the

whole of her priesthood from the amenities of married life, the solace

of domestic ties, and condemned them to a hopeless, unending

celibacy.

We must now proceed another step forward in the pursuit of
her iniquitous 4>rogress.

It might naturally be supposed, since Rome has conceived such

high notions of the angelic purity and perfection of celibacy, and

considers matrimony a defilement for those who profess a religious

life, and incompatible with the higher mysteries of her faith, that

she would have done everything in her power to keep those pure and

ignorant of unholy things whom she had thus set apart, and to

whom she denied that lawful outlet for the desires of nature.

This, surely, would have been the most suitable course, and con-

sidering the great power her superstition exercises over the minds

of men, and the right she both claims and enforces in popish coun-

tries over the literature and publications of the world—surely she
could not have more benignly and becomingly exercised those powers

than by forbidding the perusal of all unsuitable books to her bach-

elor priests, treating them as wise parents do their children, by

putting out of their reach whatever might pollute their pure minds.

But no! She has added refinement to her cruelty; and after

having condemned them to hopeless celibacy, she has dared to stim-

ulate their sensual passions by compelling them to study the most

obscene and abominable publications, calculated to inflame their de-

sires and pollute their minds.

With her usual sophistry, the Church of Rome has laid down the

following proposition: that just as a doctor ought to be intimately

acquainted with all the diseases incident to the human frame, to

qualify him as a physician of the body, so ought the priest to be

deeply versed in all the diseases of the soul, that is, in all kind

of sin, and cases of conscience, to qualify him as a physician

of souls. And, proceeding to carry out this principle, she has caused

a number of text-books to be provided for her students in theology.



PEIESTLY CELIBACY EXPOSED 13

treating of, amongst other things, all the imaginable sins which can

possibly be committed between the sexes, together with innumerable

cases of conscience connected with these subjects. These bachelor

doctors in their treastises have dared to invade the sacred precincts

of the marriage-bed, and to lay bare to the prurient curosity of the

younger students in theology, secrets which, in prospect of their vow

of celibacy, should have been concealed from them forever.

Whilst prosecuting this disgusting branch of our subject, I was

led to borrow from a friend, a ponderous folio entitled “Sanchez

De Matrimonio,^^—a monstrous volume of twelve hundred pages in

Latin, which is a great authority amongst the doctors of Eome; and,

to my horror, I found it crammed with such indecent and abominable
trash, so filthy, impure, and disgusting, that I flung it from me
with indignation into a corner, as unfit to read, and whose very touch

was pollution.

Then there is Dens’ Theology—^it is equally bad, and forms a
text-book in the College of Maynooth—so that, just as our young
men have got up Paley and Butler at Cambridge, so those students

of Maynooth must be drilled in the abominable pages ot Dens.

Such are the fruits we reap from the infatuated course our Gov-

ernment has pursued in the endowment of Maynooth.

By our liberal assistance, Eome is enabled to breed a supply
of priests, far more numerous than her diminishing Irish flock re-

quires; and after having debauched their minds with her impure

casuistry, she sends them over by troops to England to inveigle our

foolish and ignorant people, who know nothing of their tricks, and

are easily corrupted by their guile.

With what a sneer of intense contempt must the College of

Cardinals contemplate our mad career, whilst they themselves deny

the subjects oi Britain so much as burial rites, or liberty of wor-

ship!

An edition of three thousand copies of this abominable work
was published as recently as 1832, with the approbation of Dr.

Murray, who had laid claim to the title of His Grace the Archbishop

of Dublin; but when certain portions of its obscene contents were

translated into English, and the attention of the public drawn to

them, he found it convenient to deny having ever given any such

approbation. The publisher, however, very independently contra-

dicted the statement of Dr. Murray, which caused great excitement

in Dublin, during which he took his departure for Eome, whether to

seek absolution for the falsehood he had told, or not, I cannot say
—

^but, having been reassured by “his holiness” the pope, on his re-

turn, he strongly recommended this obscene book to his clergy and

said: “He had no hesitation in commending it as a useful summary
to their attentive perusal.”

Then there is another author of great celebrity, who has defiled

reams of paper with the most impure, corrupt, and disgusting details



14 PEIESTLY CELIBACY EXPOSED

that ever entered into the wild conceit of a filthy old bachelor to

imagine.

I refer to Liguori and here I must say a word or two about

the authority of his writings, for one of the Jesuitical means of de-

fense employed by Eome against her adversaries, is her being always

ready to cast overboard her friends when it is convenient so to do,

thus resembling the prudent mariner in a storm, who casts overboard

his goods to save a ship
;
but the skill of the Eomish pilot far exceeds

that of the sailor for she always contrives to take her goods on board

again, as soon as the storm is over—for whilst she deals thus un-

ceremoniously with her best friends, in controversy, she pays them

the highest honors, and makes the best possible use of them when

dealing with her own people.

Thus, if you produce that learned Doctor Sanchez, a writer of

great weight in the Church of Eome, whose foul pages are quoted as

authority by Bailly, Delahogue, Dens, and a host of others, they at

once cast him overboard, and say the Church of Eome is not re-

sponsible for the writings of a private individual. Again, if you

produce Peter Uens, and prove that the students of Maynooth and

other Eomish colleges are drilled in the contents of his impure pages,

still they cast him overboard, notwithstanding Dr. Murray’s im-

primatur, and refuse to have anything to do with him—he was only
a private individual. But, happily, they are not able to treat Liguori

in so cavalier a manner; by good fortune they have nailed his colors

to the mast with their own hands—for as late as the year 1839,
Liguori was canonized as a saint; and after all his writings had

been more than twenty times discussed by the Sacred Congregation,

they received the highest imprimatur which Eome herself could ap-

pend, it being decreed by the said Congregation, that not one word

in them had been found worthy of censure, which declaration re-

ceived the endorsement of Pope Pius VII.

And, now, indeed:

“I could a tale unfold.

Whose lightest word would harrow up your souls

;

But this eternal blazon must not be
To ears of flesh and blood.”

I warned you at the outset that we had to do with a sink of iniquity,

the very stirring of which would excite pestilent miasma, but that the

fathoming of its foul depths I could not venture. Already have I

stirred it as much as I dare; but to give you quotations from Sanchez,

Bailly, Delahogue, or filthy Dens, I cannot do it:

“Their secret filth good manners biddeth not be told.”

Advance we then a step further, in what Hogarth would have

termed Eake’s Progress, or the History of Priestly Celibacy.

After Eome has deprived the young priest of his natural rights,

and condemned him to a life of perpetual celibacy, no matter what

his temperament may be, and after she has debauched his mind

with filthy Dens and his compeers, what is the next step she takes

for the preservation of his virtue? She next decrees that every



PSIESTLY CELIBACY EXPOSED 15

woman in the parish, young or old, beautiful or ugly, modest or

immodest, her ladyship in lace, and the scullion girl that lights the

kitchen fire, shall come to him for confession, and shall be closeted

with him in private as long as he likes. And during that secret con-

ference, what are to be the topics of conversation? Is it the deep

mysteries of religion which engage their minds?

“Reason the high

Of providence, foreknowledge, will, and fate?”

Assuredly not! for now it is that Sanchez, Delahogue, Bailly, and

filthy Dens, come into play with all their impure casuistry. Now it

is that this bachelor priest is to catechise the newly-married wife,

and to bring the burning tints of shame into her pure cheek—now
it is that he must ferret into all the secrets of the marriage-chamber,

assisted by
‘

‘ Sanchez De Matrimonio, ’ ’ and ask questions which no

modest matron can endure to hear.

Next comes the tender maid, pure as the morning dew that

sparkles in the grassy glade, her simple mind like the drifted snow,

untainted with defiling stains, in blissful ignorance of sin. If there

be on earth a loathsome object of contemplation that can sicken the

heart of man, it is that of a sensual, bloated priest, whose mind

has long been debauched by the pages of Borne’s obscenest casuistry,

sitting in sly and watchful contact beside a delicate maiden, into

whose simple mind he distills the first thoughts of sin, whose cheek

he causes to mantle with the first blush of virgin shame.

Under no other form does sin appear so loathsome as when thus

concealed beneath religion’s garb; nor does man ever so closely re-
semble the “subtle adversary of souls,” as when, clad in priestly

robe, he pours his defiling strains into the confiding ear of a simple

maid:

“Squat like a toad, close at the ear of Eve,
Assaying by his devilish art to reach

The organs of her fancy, and with them forge
Illusions as he list—phantasms and dreams

—

Or if, inspiring venom, he might taint
Th’ animal spirits that from pure blood arise,
Like gentle breaths from rivers pure ; thence rise
At least distemper’d, discontented thoughts.
Vain hopes, vain aims, inordinate desires.”

Bailly gives the following instructions to a priest-confessor: “If

the penitent be a girl, let her be asked, has she ornamented herself

in dress so as to please the male sex? or for the same end has

she painted herself, or bared her arms, her shoulders, or her bosom?

Whether she has frequented church in order that she might show

herself to be looked at? Whether, in company with others, she has

spoken, read, or sung, anything immodest? Whether she is not at-

tached to someone? Whether she has not allowed him to take lib-

erties with her? Whether she has not allowed him to kiss her? But

if opportunity shall offer for carrjdng the inquiry farther, the con-

fessor will do his duty, but, however, prudently and cautiously.”

Only think of the unparalleled impudence of these bachelor priests

*BailIy, vol. vii. p. 366.



16 PEIESTLY CELIBACY EXPOSED

in thus catechising young ladies I I must confess that if I were one

of the fair penitents and a saucy priest put any such impertinent

questions to me, I should box his ears for him and never cross the

threshold of his inquisitorial vestry again.

But all that wait on the disciple of Sanchez, Liguori, and filthy

Dens, are not so delicate, refined, and pure as those who have al-
ready engaged our thoughts. There come in troops, men and women
of all sorts, to confess and obtain absolution; many of them stained
with vices of the deepest dye; every kind of tale, every description

of sin, every particularity of immodest thoughts, words, and acts,

are poured into the prurient ear of the listening priests, so that his

mind, at length, becomes a 'great immoral cesspool, into which all the

impurities of the district drain, and which must receive all the filth

of an entire community. Knowing what I do of a Bomish priest,
I never wonder that he cannot look an honest man in the face, for
what with his study of Bomish unclean casuistry, what with his

debauching pure minds with his filthy questions drawn from those

authorized sources, what with his receiving into his own mind all the

adulteries, fornications, unnatural crimes, unholy actions, desires, and

thoughts, of all the countryside, his mind becomes a quagmire of

foul, pestilent impurities, the consciousness of which is stamped on

his very forehead.

We have now made the following progress with our subject. We
have seen the Church of Borne propounding a rule of life, opposed to

the law of nature, binding the iron shackles of compulsory celibacy

on her priesthood. We have seen her corrupting their minds with
lessons of impurity, and defiling their imaginations with unclean

sophistry; and, lastly, we have seen her sending them forth into the

world, where a principal part of their duty consists in confessing

females in private; or, in other words, conversing with them on top-

ics most calculated to infiame their passions.

And now, I would ask this audience, whether it is possible her
I'riesthood can be preserved pure under these circumstances? Ee-

member that this process is commenced in youth, when temptation

to sin is at the strongest, and the passions most ungovemed. Ee-

member, also, it is not only the quiet, the demure, the frigid, who

are subjected to this discipline, but the hot-tempered, the passionate,

the sensual. Look at those burly Maynooth priests, men of the
coarsest clay who are lashing their infatuated and deigraded fol-

lowers into fury, uproar, and bloodshed, from time to time, in the

sister Isle; think you that these fellows are to be trusted alone with

females, after having feasted upon Sanchez and filthy Dens? As-

suredly not; the system is one of monstrous corruption, the fruitful

parent of immorality and vice; and it remains for me now to show
you what results have proceeded from it, the practical fruits it has

ever borne. The testimony of history, and the voice of experience

have ever witnessed to this fact, that compulsory celibacy has always

been attended with frightful corruption.

We must now proceed to facts; once more I am reminded of the



PEIESTLY CELIBACY EXPOSED 17

danger of stirring that cesspool, on the borders of which we stand.

Without facts, however, it is impossible to establish the statement I

have made; and the difficulty is not to find the facts, which super-

abound, but to select those which can, with any decency, be produced.

A solemn sense of the responsible duty, in times like these, to open
the eyes of men to the corruptions of the Church of Eome, has alone

induced me to enter on this revolting subject, and I shall spare your

feelings as much as I can, yet the truth must be told.

The result of a compulsory celibacy has always been to deprave

the morals of the community, and especially of those themselves

placed in that false position. I shall proceed to bring forth from

the cesspool of history, a few of the facts by which this statement

is borne out, and they shall refer to the different ages, since the

experiment was tried—early, mediaeval, and present times.
With respect to the evil consequences of celibacy in early times,

I would observe, that what I shall adduce refers not exclusively to

clerical celibacy, for that was not established, as we have seen, till

the dark age of Hildebrand; but I conceive the case becomes all the

stronger, for if monks and nuns, under a foolish vow of celibacy,

did nevertheless fall into sin, so that the whole Church became scan-

dalized thereby, though the system of confession did not exist, and

the writings of filthy Dens had not yet appeared, how much stronger

the case against the present system of ecclesiastical celibacy, with

all these evil adjuncts to boot!

Cyprian, in the third century, inveighed against the nuns on

account of their shameless licentiousness; and this was not a local

or incidental abuse, for it has spread itself on all sides, and had

become, notwithstanding all remonstrances, the common usages of

the Coenobite ascetics, and even of some of the anchorites.

Chrysostom, a century and a half later, though he was a warm

admirer of celibacy, yet uttered the following mournful, but some-

what ridiculous, complaint of its evil effects:

What a sight it is,’^ says he, ^‘to enter the cell of a solitary
monk, and to see the apartment hung about with female gear, shoes,

girdles, reticules, caps, bonnets, spindles, combs, and the like, too

many to mention. But what a jest it is to visit the abode of a rich

monk, and to look about you, for you find the solitary monk sur-

rounded with a bevy of lasses one might say, just like ^e leader of
a company of singing and dancing girls. What can be more dis-
graceful? And in fact the monk is all day long vexed and busied
with petty affairs proper to a woman. Not merely is he occupied

with worldly matters, contrary to the apostolic precept, but even

with feminine cares; and these ladies being very luxurious in their

habits, as well as imperious in their tempers, the good man was
liable to be sent on fifty errands; to the silversmith’s, to inquire if

my lady’s mirror were finished, if her vase were ready, if her scent-
cruet had been .returned;, and from the silver-smith’s to the per-



18 PRIESTLY CELIBACY EXPOSED

fumer’s, and thence to the linen-drapers, and thence to the uphol-

sterer’s, and at each place he has twenty particulars to remember.

Then add to all these cares the jars and scoldings that are apt to

resound in a house full of pampered women! St. Paul says, ‘Be ye

not the servants of men
;

’ shall we not then cease to be the slaves

of women, and this to the common injury of all?”

This is certainly a very curious peep which old Chrysostom gives

us into the habits of the fourth Century, and the raillery of the

ancient divine would almost make one fancy that it was Will Honey-

comb pouring forth his sparkling wit in the pages of the ‘‘Specta-

tor.
’

’ But where, we are apt to exclaim, have the expurgatorial doc-

tors of the ‘‘Index” been? If her nimble scissors could clip the

pages of Father Chrysostom, when he made so simple a statement as

that ‘‘all the prophets had wives,” what were they about to leave

unimpaired so profane an exposure of the habits of the monks?

I would here observe, that it would be a very useful thing to

publish an edition of Chrysostom’s works in Stockton; for amongst

them are to be found two treatises, one against clerics and virgins

dwelling together, another against virgins dwelling with clerics, which

treatises, had they been some time ago duly studied and regarded,

might have been the means of preventing much scandal in this place.

And as it is said there is nothing new under the sun, l!et me tell you

the reasons given in defense of this ancient custom. For Chrysostom

informs us that, notwithstanding the obloquy it brought upon the

church amongst the heathen, and the scandal it created amongst be-

lievers, the clerics persisted in having young women to dwell with

them, under the pretense of patronage to the worthy, and defense to

the helpless.

I pretend not sufficient skill in the laws and discipline of the

Roman Church to be able to tell whether the decisions of the Second

Council of Arles, which was held in the fifth century, be now in

force; all I would say is, that had they been observed in the town

of Stockton, the tongue of scandal had been restrained her license;

for by that council it was enjoined, ‘‘that no person in holy orders,

above that of a deacon, should have dwelling under his roof of any

woman, save his grandmother, his daughter, his niece, or his wife.”

Much more needful, methinks, now-a-days, this wholesome statute,
when Romish priests are forbidden either wives or daughters, though

in some parts of the world they still have nieces enough, who, the

tongue of rumor reports, do ofttimes ‘‘dwell under thek roof.”

Harken now, to Chrysostom’s mournful dirge over the obsequies

of fallen celibacy:

“Alas! my soul, may I well exclaim, and repeat the lamentable
cry with the prophet, alas! my soul—our virginity has fallen into
contempt; the veil is rent by impudent hands that parted it from

matrimony; the holy of holies is trodden under foot, and its grave

and tremendous sanctities have become profane: and that which was



PRIESTLY CELIBACY EXPOSED 19

once had in reverence as far more excellent than matrimony is now

sunk so low as that one should rather call the married blest/*

Such were the fruits of celibacy in the third and fourth cen-

turies.

We will now proceed down the course of time to the mediaeval
age of Gregory the First, who flourished in the sixth century, and

see how it fared with celibacy in these later times.

Gregory was a great zealot in favor of clerical celibacy, as we

have already seen; but what were the fruits of his enforcing his

unnatural law we learn from the following narrative, given us by

Udalric, bishop of Augusta, in a letter to Nicholas the First, where

he says, “Gregory, by his decree, deprived priests of their wives;

when, heads of six thousand infants that had been drowned in short-

ly after, he commanded that some fish be caught from the fish-ponds,

the fishers, instead of fish, found the ponds. When Gregory ascer-
tained that the children thus killed were born from the concealed

sin of the priests, he forthwith recalled his decree and purged the

sin with worthy fruits of repentance, extolling the apostolic com-

mand, “It is better to marry than to burn,** adding from himself,

“It is better to marry than to be the occasion of death.**

Such were the fruits of celibacy under Gregory in the sixth

century I

We now come to the testimony of the celebrated Bernard in
the twelfth century. He exclaims, “If, according to the prophet

of Ezekiel, we could look behind the partition, that we might see the

horrible thing in the house of the Lord, perhaps the foulest abomina-

tions would appear on the inside. Alas! the enemy of man hath
defiled the body of the church with the execrable ashes of the Sod-

omites, and indeed, the most filthy and abominable crimes have de-

filed some of its very ministers also. Many of these cannot be con-
cealed on account of their multitude, nor, by reason of their im-

pudence, do they court concealment; would that those who cannot

contain, would fear to enroll themselves as the adherents of celibacy!

It is better to marry than to burn, and to be saved in the humble

grade of the common people, than to live worse, and to be judged
more severely in the sublime ranks of the clergy.**

Pass we now from those dark ages of acknowledged corruption

to modern times, and let us see what are the effects of compulsory

celibacy in this age of superior refinement and morality wherein we

live. Would we judge of the system fairly, however, we must see
how it works in really Romish countries, where it is unrestrained by

the watchful supervision of Protestant eyes and is able to indulge

its prurient tendencies without tear of detection.

First, then, let us turn our attention to South America; there

the celibacy of the priesthood has settled down into a tacitly ac-

knowledged system of concubinage, which differs little from matri-

mony, except in the absence of the hallowed sanction of the marriage-

bond. A sea captain, who traded to South America, told me some



20 PRIESTLY CELIBACY EXPOSED

years ago that when his ship was lying in one of the ports of that
country, a Romish priest came on board one day desirous of en-

gaging a passage for himself and his niece. The captain forthwith

led him to the gentlemen’s cabin, where he selected one of the best

state-rooms
;
after which the captain proposed to show him the ladies

’

cabin, that he might choose one for his niece, but the reverend gentle-

man declined, saying that the one he had chosen would do very well
for them both! Our worthy captain, however, whose unsophisticated

notions of celibacy could not understand such strange relationships,

in a burst of honest indignation turned the reverend paramour out

of his ship, and vowed that neither he nor his niece should ever set

foot on board again.

That system of concubinage is not confined to South America,

and is not an invention of the present refined age, for we read in

Nicholas de Clemangis (about A. D. 1400), ‘‘In many dioceses the
rectors of parishes, for a certain stipulated sum to the prelates,

generally and openly kept concubines.”*

And among the Helvetians, it was an ancient use and custom,
that, when they received any new priest into their churches, they

would premonish him to take his concubine, lest he should attempt

any misuse with their wives and daughters.

A certain German bishop is reported to have said at a certain
banquet, that in one year there were brought, unto him eleven thou-

sand priests which openly kept concubines.*

We will now turn our attention nearer home, and inquire into
the effects of celibacy at the present day in Spain and France.

The Rev. Joseph jslanco White, a Spanish priest of great celeb-

rity and unquestionable veracity, writing on the celibacy of the

priesthood, expresses himself as follows

:

“My feelmgs are so painfully vehement, when I dwell upon
this subject, that neither the freedom I have enjoyed for years, nor

the last repose of the victims, the remembrance of whom still wrings

tears from my eyes, can allay the bitter pangs of my youth. A
more blameless, ingenuous, religious set of youths, than that in the

enjoyment of whose friendship I passed the best years of my life,
the world cannot boast of. Eight of us, all nearly of the same age,

lived in the closest bond of affection from sixteen till one and

twenty. Of this knot of friends not one was tainted by the breath

of gross vice, till the church had doomed them to a life of celibacy,

and turned the best affections of their hearts into crime. It is the

very refinement of church cruelty to say they were free, when they

deprived themselves of their natural rights. A virtuous youth of
one and twenty, who is made to believe Christian perfection insep-

arable from a life of celibacy, will easily overlook the dangers which

beset that state of life. Those who made and those who still sup-

port the unnatural law, which turns the mistaken piety of youth

into a source of future vice, ought to have learned mercy from their

own experience; but a priest who has waded, as most do, through



PEIESTLY CELIBACY EXPOSED 21

the miry slough of a life of incessant temptation, falling and rising,

stumbling, struggling, and falling again, contracts, generally, habits

of mind not unlike those of the guards of oriental beauty. Their

hearts have been seared with envy.

“I cannot think on the wanderings of the friends of my youth
without heartrending pain. One, now no more, whose talents raised

him to one of the highest dignities of the Church of Spain, was for

many years a model of Christian purity; when, by the powerful in-

fluence of his mind, and the warmth of his devotion, this man had

drawn many into the clerical and religious life, he sank at once into

the grossest and most daring profligacy; I heard him boast that the

night before the solemn procession of Corpus Christi, where he ap-

peared yearly at the head of his chapter, one of two children had

been bom, which his two concubines had brought to light within a

few days of each other.

‘
‘ Such, more or less, has been the fate of my early friends,

whose minds and hearts were much above the common standard of

the Spanish clergy. What then, need 1 say of the vulgar crowd of

priests, who coming, as the Spanish phrase has it, from coarse

swaddling clothes, and raised by ordination to a rank of life for

which they have not been prepared, mingle vice and superstition,

grossness of feeling and pride of office, in their character?”*

What a complete likeness does this graphic picture bear to the

Maynooth priest, supported by English money, ana then sent forth

like the plagues of Egypt, over our country, to corrupt the morals

and pervert the faith of our people!

We must now turn to France. The following description of
the priests of that country is from one of themselves, and is ex-

tracted from a work entitled,
‘

‘ Confessions of a French Catholic

Priest,” edited by Samuel Morse, in the year 1836, in the city of

New York.

‘‘I shall surprise you by saying, that in France the immense

majority of our young men in our seminaries are not corrupted;

many of them are virtuous. They are ignorant, superstitious, fanat-
ical, but I declare they are not vicious; that may be conceded, al-
though apparently in contradiction to their indecent studies—for

they are taught it is necessary to learn these in order to be able to

fufill their duty, and that, to hear confession in aU its extent, it is

necessary to know all human perversity. Be that as it may, I can
affirm that it is painful to the sense of decency in man to be obliged
to be familiar, as we are, with such books.

“But the corruption of the clergy begins when they are out of
the seminary. Young men are sent into a parish in the quality of
curates or vicars. At the commencement they fulfill their duty with
care, and for a time remain faithful to their vows. Many have fold
me this after their fall. By and by they open their astonished eyes.

*Lasicius in Theolog. Moscov. cap. 16, ex Joann, peregrin in conviv.
p. 158. Spirae, 682.



22 PKIESTLY CELIBACY EXPOSED

Kestored to freedom, after ten or twelve years’ thraldom in a college,

they become dilferent men, and gradually forget their vowi. ‘OhI’

said a young priest, with tears in his eyes, after having four or five

years discharged the duties of his station, ‘God only knows what I

have suffered during this time: If I have fallen, it is not without

fighting: had I been allowed to choose a wife, as such is the law

of God, who destines man to marriage, whatever our rules teach to
the contrary, I should have remained virtuous; I should have been

the happiest man in the world; I should have been a good and holy

priest, while now I am—0 ! I am ashamed of myself ! ’ ”

What a sad picture is this! and does it not call forth our feel-

ings of sympathy and compassion toward those unhappy men who are

placed under such cruel bondage, and exposed to such superhuman

temptations, by the ambition and the wickedness of the Church of

Eomcf

Our author proceeds: “The resolution being taken of enjoying

life, as they say, after having been so long deprived of it, the only

question is to enjoy it safely and secretly, viz., without dishonor.

In this manner, through their dark ministry, they have immense

power upon the minds of women, for they attack oniy those whose

dispositions they have long studied in confession. A priest, in a
parish not far from mine, laid his snare for a young married woman,

who had the reputation for piety because she attended mass every

morning. He, through his diabolical arguments, triumphed over her

scruples. She went to him in the vestry almost every morning, before

the bell rang for mass. He confessed and absolved her, and she
received the communion at the altar. The good people said, admir-

ing her daily practice. ‘How pious is this young wife; she partakes

of the sacrament every day
;
she is doubtless a saint !

’

“There are no means which their cunning does not invent to

meet with victims. But if a priest, in spite of his proverbial cun-

ning, be discovered and be denounced to the bishop by public opin-

ion, he may be removed in order to silence the scandal, and sent to

a distance where he is unknown.”

There is a vari-ety of details of a similar kind, which time will

not permit me to produce, showing how disastrous are the results of

th.s wicked compulsion to celibacy over the morals of the priests in

France at the present day.

Seeing then, that such is the immoral tendency of celibacy in

Koman countries, are we to suppose that the system fares any better

in other lands! If it could be shown that this were really the case,

what a triumph it would be over Rome. If, after the unquestionable

evidence that wherever Rome is dominant her celibate priesthood is

dissolute, it could be shown that in other lands they are pure, surely

this would be a strong admission in favor of non-Catholicism
;
and the

Church of Rome should feel deeply indebted to those she stigmatizes

as heretics, since they have done for her priesthood what with all

her power she is unable to do herself, viz., to keep them pure. But



PEIESTLY CELIBACY EXPOSED 23

I claim no such merit on our behalf, for I don’t believe that a

celibate priesthood is pure in England, any more than in South

America, Spain, France, or any other popish country. They are men

of like passions with their brethren abroad, and the same causes

will produce the same effects; the only difference being that greater

caution and circumspection must be used where non-Catholic eyes

are looking on, and a free press is ever ready to hold up the offender

to public ignominy and shame.

Now the statements which I have produced are entirely borne

out by the testimony of Rome herself. We never think of making
laws against crime tiU the crime itself exists. I don’t believe that

ever there was a law against sheep-stealing tiU after sheep had been

frequently stolen, and men began to find the loss of their sheep an

intolerable nuisance. Now, so corrupt a thing is celibacy, that it

has given rise to a new crime, and Rome enjoys the unenviable no-

toriety of having to enact ecclesiastical statutes to check a vice un-

known to the rest of the Christian world.

This crime is knovm by the name of “ Solicitatio, ” and its
perpetrators are called

‘
‘ Solicitants.

’
’ In plain English, it is the

seduction, or attempt at seduction, of a female penitent by a priest

in the confessional.

So scandalous was the immorality of the priesthood in Spain in

the sixteenth century, that Paul IV. was obliged to issue a bull, of

which the following is an extract: ‘‘Whereas certain ecclesiastics

in the kingdom of Spain, and in cities and dioceses thereof, having

the cure of souls, have broken out into such heinous acts of iniquity

as to abuse the sacrament of penance, in the very act of hearing the

confessions, by enticing and provoking females to lewd actions, at

the very time when they were making their confessions. * * *

Such was the prefatory introduction to this famous bull of

Paul IV. And the blow aimed at her immoral priesthood was fol-
lowed up by solemn edict of the inquisitors, published in all churches

of the Archbishopric of Seville, that
‘

‘ any person knowing, or having

heard of any friar or clergyman having committed the said crime,

should make discovery of what he knew, within thirty days, to the
Holv Tribunal.”

When this edict was published such ‘‘a number of females went
to the palace of the Inquisitor in Seville alone, to reveal the conduct

of their infamous confessors, that twenty notaries, and as many in-
quisitors, were appointed to take down their several informations;

but these being found insufficient, and the inquisitors being over-

whelmed with such pressure of business, thirty days more were al-

lowed for taking the accusations; and this time proving likewise in-

sufficient, had to be extended again and again. Ladies of rank,

character, and noble family, flocked to the Tribunal; but the authori-

ties in Rome were so alarmed at the storm they had raised, that,
fearful of the consequences of such an exposure, they hushed mat-

ters up the best way they could; and this Holy Tribunal, contrary



24 PRIESTLY CELIBACY EXP0SE15

to the expectation of everyone, put an end to the business, by order-

ing that all crimes of this nature should henceforth be consigned

to perpetual silence and oblivion.”*

Many bulls have since been published, proving that this mon-

strous vice still abounded. Thus, Gregory XV., in 1622, Benedict

XIV., in 1741, and again in 1745, fulminated their ineffectual thun-

ders against those priestly celibates who were guilty of so mon-

strous a crime.

I cannot close this branch of our subject without a word or

two about nunneries.

Such is the authority which Rome now arrogates for herself

within the territories of Queen Victoria, that notwithstanding the

majesty and power of the law extend over the length and breadth

of the land, yet has Rome dared to set the officer of justice at

defiance, and to say to him,
‘

‘ Thus far shalt thou come, but no

further.” There is no nook or corner in this well-ordered country

whither the ends of justice may not be pursued, save and except

those consecrated prisons which Rome has established on the free

soil of Britain, whose grated portals bid defiance to the authority

of the Queen on her throne.

It is too bad that Romish priests should be permitted to inveigle

young women into nunneries in this land of liberty, and having got

them there, should be suffered to lock them up in durance vile; when

once their tender feet have been involved in the snares and bird-

lime set for them by Romeos bird-catchers, farewell forever all hope

of liberty! However much they afterwards repent the foolish step

—

however widely their eyes may afterwards be opened—though their
heart-strings should crack with passionate desires of freedom, and

their souls sicken in the hopeless despair of perpetual bondage—for

them no door of hope is open, no avenue of mercy within their

reach;—though dwelling on the soil of Britain, the land of freedom,
yet are they the veriest slaves, the serfs of Rome, compared with

whose most pitiable condition the negro’s servitude is an enviable

lot.

To such an extent has Rome carried her defiance of law, that

an honored stranger has been robbed in England of his lawful

wife, and to this moment is unable to obtain justice in this land.

I blush for our country, for the weakness of law, for our de-

based subserviency to Rome, that a stranger should have appealed

in vain for justice at the highest tribunal, and that the house of

commons should have turned a deaf ear to a petition ^‘to right a

poor man in his brave struggle, after long endurance in l^gland of

such wrong as no tribe of red Indians in his native land would not

have risen up en masse to vindicate upon its perpetrator. My heart

Narrative of the Inquisition, etc., by Hyppolite Joseph Da Costa Pereiro
Hurtado de Mendoza, vol. 1, pp. 117-119.



Pl^IESTLY CELIBACY EXPOSED 25

bleeds for the sufferings which Pierce Connelly has endured in our

land at the hands of Eome. It makes one hang one^s head, and al-

most ashamed of the name of Englishman, to think that our country

could suffer such indignities and such injustices to be heaped on the

head of a stranger, who has in vain demanded, petitioned, and im-

plored that his lawful wife be set free from the clutches of Eome,

and restored to her husband and children.

Whenever nunneries have been thrown open to public gaze, they

have proved the dens of infamy and shame, little better than eccle-

siastical seraglios, so that one ceases to wonder at the watchful

jealousy of the priestly porters.

If it be, as their advocates contend, that these secluded sisters

are so serenely happy, so tranquil and contented, so virtuous and so

seraphic, so blessed with celestial peace and joy in their voluntary

retirement, then I ask, why those gloomy walls, those massive locks,

those grated windows, those blockaded portals? As soon would I

believe that the wire cage that confines the mournful lark was not

expressly meant to bar her egress to the joyous fields, where, rising

on gladsome wing, and towering to heaven’s gate, she might pour

her celestial notes in joyful strain, wild in the freedom of her glad

escape— as that these bars and bolts of monastic gloom are not

placed to check the longed-for escape of imprisoned slaves.

Such strict watch and guard, however, are needed, not merely

to retain the bodies of unwilling victims, but likewise to place re-

straint on rumor, with her many tongues, that deeds of darkness

may not come to light.

I will now, however, give you a few revelations of what goes

on inside these nunneries, notwithstanding the lynx-eyed jealousy

of their priestly conservators to coneal it from the light of day.

In the year 673, the Council of Cloveshoe found it necessary

to order that “the monasteries should not be turned into places

of amusement for harpers and buffoons, and that laymen should not

be admitted within their walls too freely, lest they might be scan-

dalized at -the offenses they might discover there
;
because on this

account, not only causes of divers and nefarious suspicion arises, but

they are propagated and repeated, to this disgrace of our profession.

Wherefore let not the cells of the nuns be the abodes of shameful

talking, drunkenness, and luxury.”*

Boniface wrote as follows, in A. D. 730: “And we are in-
formed of that which is worse; this crime of greatest magnitude

(fornication) is committed with nuns throughout the convents, and

with virgins dedicated to God. It is to be noted that in that crime

another great wickedness lies, because, whilst those harlots produce

offspring wickedly conceived in sin, they often, for the most part.

*Wilkins’ Concilia, i. 97.



26 PEIESTLY CELIBACY EXPOSED

kill them, not filling the Church of Christ with adopted sons, but

satiating the grave with bodies, and hell with miserable souls.

In the year 1777, ‘‘thirty nuns of the monastery of Amesbury

were accused and convicted for their unclean lives, whereupon the

king, having expelled the nuns for their incontinence, distributed

them in other houses, to be strictly iguarded.
’

’1:

But I might detain you till midnight with details of this kind,

and we therefore advance on to the day of Eeformation, when a

thorough exposure of these infamous houses was made, and we are

able to ascertain what was the state of the nunneries of England

in the sixteenth century. The commissioners appointed by Henry

VIII. to inquire into the state of the monasteries, reported that

“monstrous disorders were found in many religious houses—whole
convents of women abandoned to lewdness, signs of abortion pro-

cured, of infants murdered, and of unnatural lusts.
’ ’

This testimony

was confirmed by another body of commissioners appointed, not by

Henry, but by Paul III,

Similar details I could give you, did the time permit, of the

immoral state of nunneries in succeeding years, nearer our own

times; thus it is related, “that on taking down two convents of

monks and nuns that were contiguous, about fifty years ago, there

tumbled out as many dry bones of infants as would fill a large

basket, and a private trap door was found that communicated from

one convent to the other.

A

precisely similar discovery took place

a few days ago at Quebec, when, on clearing away the foundation

of a nunnery, a quantity of bones and remains of infants were found

beneath the pavement.

And now coming down to our own times, in the year 1823, the

bodies of two newly-born infants were found by the gardner, buried

within the walls of the nunnery of Dungarvon. This discovery,

though suppressed by the priests, at length blazed out and came to

trial, when it was clearly proved that Father Maher, P. P., of Dun-

garvon, was the father of these children, by two nuns of the house;

and three servants testified on oath that the said Father Maher had

had improper intercourse with no less than nine of these nuns at

certain intervals.

And lastly, 1 shall give you a peep into our English nunneries
at the present time. A lady, confined in an English nunnery, as we
have reason to suppose, against her will, or at all events against her

husband's will, has communicated to her husband an attempt made

upon her chastity by a Romish priest. Under these circumstances

I am not at all surprised that the injured husband should feel him-
self aggrieved or complain that “the copper Cardinal has a suite

of apartments in the same house with my wife; and though he or

fEpist. of Boniface to Etaelbald.

jPrynne, ii. 228.

Hist, of Switzerland, p. 767.



PRIESTLY CELIBACY EXPOSED 27

any filthy priest may be closeted with her alone, and by authority,

for hours, yet at this moment, in England, that mother is not allowed

to see her daughter for one moment alone.”

The following statement may further satisfy your mind, if

further proof you need, that at the present day, in England, those

closely watched and carefully barred nunneries are not at all times

seats of secluded innocency, angelic purity, and celestial devotion:

“1 had a long audience of leave from the Pope, in 1848, and

was charged by His Holiness with a message to a near relative,

living in a convent in England. On arriving, in June, I went to the

convent and rang at the priest’s door; I was told that the priest

was not up, as he was not well, and I was shown into a parlor.

After waiting for some time, I went up stairs, and opened his bed-

room door. The priest was quite well; he was not more than half

dressed, and a young nun was standing by him, who, on seeing me,

immediately fled. I made a representation to the bishop, but the

]iriost Avas not removed.”

I am indebted for the above to Mr. Drummond, who has thor-
oughly exposed the fllthy purlieus of a nunnery, in his able pamphlet,

and he is prepared to produce the name of the person from whom

he received this communication. I believe the priestly paramour thus

detected was none other than Dr. Asperti, whom Mr. C. Connelly
denounced to Dr. Ullathorne, as having detected him with a nun in

his bed-chamber.

I think I have now given you facts enough to satisfy any

reasonable man of the immoral tendency of priestly celibacy; and if

there be any individual present who does not understand the subject,

I must decline the attempt to enlighten that man’s mind.

It may be asked, what possible motive can Rome have for
clinging with such tenacity to this unnatural law of celibacy? When
hard driven by her adversaries, she is obliged to give up scriptural

authority and to plead that it is merely a matter of discipline; but

she has had painful experience of that discipline, she has found it

a total failure, she has long discovered its immoral tendencies, and

by her edicts and bulls has proclaimed its mischievous consequences.

Like unto whited sepulchers, it has indeed appeared beautiful out-

wardly, but within it is full of dead infants’ bones and all un-

cleanliness. Instead of promoting sanctity, it has produced vice;

instead of exalting men to heights of seraphic holiness, it has de-
based them in the mire of impurity.

Why, then, persist in it, since it is only a matter of discipline

and has failed so ©gregiously? I will tell you why: True, it has

utterly failed to restrain or sanctify the priesthood, but it has not

failed of the great end which Hildebrand had in view from the first,

OT>d which, since then, has never been lost sight of by the crafty

rulers of Rome. It has not failed as an instrument of her aggran-

dizement and her power.

The celibacy of the clergy may be termed one of the most



28 PEIE^TLY CELIBACY EXPOSED

powerful political engines ever devised by cunning and wielded by

ambition; by this means the pope has brought into existence an

ecclesiastical body-guard for the defense of popedom throughout the

world; a corps of spiritual Janizaries, detached from all ties, domes-

tic, social, patriotic—men without family, without country, without
aim or object, except the aggrandizement of their body, in blind

obedience to their spiritual head.

No wonder, then, that the pope of Eome clings with instinctive

grasp to the doctrine of priestly celibacy. No wonder that he turned

a deaf ear to the outcries of Germany, when the representative of

the people in the kingdom of Wuertemburg did, from time to

time, solicit him that their clergy might be allowed to marry.

No wonder that he turned a deaf ear to the petition of the un-

happy slaves of this vicious custom, a petition signed by two hun-

dred and eighty Eomish clergymen, in the grand dukedom of Baden,

imploring His Holiness to repeal the obnoxious law, to knock off

their embittered shackles, and give them leave to marry.

But no! the celibacy of the clergy is too useful an instrument,

too powerful a weapon! Eome will never cancel the decree of Hilde-

brand, for by it she is furnished with such a body of spies as

never secular tyrant could boast of.

She has sent forth her emissaries over the face of the earth,

everywhere devoted to her service, cut off from all inferior attach-

ments of family and country to do her bidding. Napoleon had his

spies in every quarter, but that great general could only survey the

outside of things by means of his espionage. Eome gets within,

scans the secret motives of men’s deeds, has tidings of every con-

templated act, private and public, before its execution; by means

of this power she reigns as a queen, and laughs at the princes of

the earth. Give up the celibacy of the clergy? No, never! Never

whilst she can -wield the sceptre of her power, seated on the seven

hills.

Eome has put dishonor upon the sacred bond of matrimony; for
though she pretends to exalt it as a sacrament in order that she

may have priestly power to exercise, or in qther words, what she
loves above all things, a finger in every man’s pie; yet she has in-

sulted the marriage bond, by extolling celibacy as a far holier state;

her -writers constantly express themselves in terms derogatory of

marriage, and only the other day Mr. Connelly was abused by the

orp-pn of Eome as ‘^a filthy old man,” for desiring the restitution
of his lawful -wife.

Matrimony is adapted for the highest development of all that

is great and good in man; the union of the two sexes, in the en-

dearments of domestic and social life, is that state which is best

calculated to lead on both to perfection, to soften what is harsh, to

strengthen what is weak; it ennobles the human character, draws



PEIEGTLY CELIBACY EXPOSED 29

forth the sympathies of our nature, gives scope for the best feelings

of the heart, excites the noblest energies of the soul.

"Love refines

The thoughts, the heart enlarges, hath his seat

In reason, and is judicious ; is the scale

By which to heavenly love thou mayst ascend.
Not sunk in carnal pleasure.”

Eome has degraded woman from her rightful place in the family

of man; has dragged her from the social board and the happy ties of

domestic life; has corrupted her mind; has imprisoned her body in

doleful solitude, where she is kept against her will; and I say, had

Eome no other guilt to answer for than the wrongs she has inflicted

on woman, she would still deserve the eternal execrations of man-

kind.

Are we then to remain in tame quiescence, whilst our deadly

foe, "with rampant energy, invades our domestic hearth, to rob us of

our social peace and home-endearing joys?

Most assuredly not! Morals decay, female purity fades,* the

human mind degenerates beneath the blight of Eome’s unhallowed

breath; and hampered though we be by truckling politicians and

luke-warm friends, there is, I trust, enough of stern, uncompromising

principle left amongst us to make Eome stand back and to drive

her from our shores in dire disgrace. The ashes of our martyrs

are still revered, the blood they shed still cries for justice, the

candle they lighted, though dimmed, is not extinguished; and, I

trust, the coming struggle—for come it must—^wiU rid this land
forever from the cure of priestly celibacy, and all the other mon-

strous figments of Eome^s unhallowed creed.

The Rev. Mr. Seymour has recently published some statistics, which
bring to light the awful, and almost incredible, immorality of popish coun-
tries—an immorality intimately connected with the subject of this lecture,
nay, one of the natural and necessa^ consequences of priestly celibacy,
which seems to have assisted in depraving the morals of a large portion of

the community, and has succeeded in lowering the standard of female virtue,
compared with other countries, by at least forty or fifty per cent.





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