UC-NRLF 
 
 ID 
 
 o 
 
I 
 
 
LETTER 
 
 TO 
 
 CHARLES BUTLER, ESQ.' 
 
 ON HIS NOTICE OF THE 
 
 "PRACTICAL AND INTERNAL EVIDENCE 
 
 AGAINST 
 
 CATHOLICISM:" 
 
 REV. J. BLANCO WHITE, M.A. 
 
 M 
 
 Of the University of Oxford. 
 
 LONDON: 
 
 MURRAY, ALBEMARLE STREET; RIVINGTONS, 
 
 ST. PAUL'S CHURCHYARD, AND WATERLOO PLACE, PALL MALL ; 
 
 AND HATCHARDS, PICCADILLY. 
 
 1826. 
 

 
 
 
 LONDON : 
 
 PRINTED BY CHARLES WOOD, 
 Poppin's Court, Fleet Street, 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 I. 
 
 General Remarks on the incompetence of any individual or 
 individuals of the Roman Catholic Churchy to explain 
 away or modify the declarations of their Supreme Spiritual 
 Authority. True light in which they must be regarded as 
 forming a body of men under spiritual allegiance 2 
 
 II. 
 
 Mr. Butler's Answer to the Charge of mistranslating a pas- 
 sage in Paulus JEmilius Veronensis, examined 10 
 
 HI. 
 
 Policy of the Roman Catholic Priesthood in England, to 
 conceal some of the most objectionable Tenets of their 
 Church 16 
 
 IV. 
 
 Delusive Expositions of the Roman Catholic Doctrine of Ex- 
 clusive Salvation, examined. 1. Doctrine of Exclusive 
 Salvation, as explained by the Author of " Truth and 
 Charity.' 9 2. Exclusive Salvation, as declared by the 
 Irish Roman Catholic Bishops 32 
 
 V. 
 
 Charge of a mistake, relating to the Test and Abjuration 
 Oaths, attributed by Mr. Butler to the Author, answered. 
 An Oath of Security suggested, as a test of the tendency of 
 the Doctrine of Exclusive Salvation 46 
 
 VI. 
 
 1. Uncertain sense of the appellation, Roman Catholic 
 Church. Increase of power to the Roman Catholic Priest- 
 hood, arising from its vagueness. 2. Declaration which 
 
iv CONTENTS. 
 
 Rome must make, in order that her spiritual subjects may 
 safely be trusted with irresponsible power in a Protestant 
 
 kingdom 52 
 
 VII. 
 
 The Protestant Churches, especially that of England, defended 
 from the imputation of holding Exclusive Salvation in the 
 Romanist sense 52 
 
 VIII. 
 
 Mr. Butler's shifting the true point in question, by a, perpetual 
 recurrence to the temporal and the deposing power of the 
 Pope. 1. Roman Catholics still cling to the source of 
 intolerance which has inundated Europe with blood. 2. Bel- 
 larmine's reason for putting heretics to death. That reason 
 prevalent in Spain a few years since. 3. Policy recom- 
 mended by Bellarmine in the enforcement of persecution 69 
 
 IX. 
 
 Unfair manner in which the Author's testimony and arguments 
 are met 80 
 
 X. 
 
 Mr. Butler's connection with the British Catholic Association, 
 as it affects this controversy , examined 99 
 
 XL 
 
 Remarks on the Slanders propagated by the British Catholic 
 Association 107 
 
 APPENDIX. 
 
 Copy and Translation of the Author's Letter to his Chapter 
 in Spain, resigning his preferment 128 
 
 ADDITIONAL NOTE. 
 
 Original Authority which proves, that the Pope at one time 
 conceived himself, and was believed to be, an object of divine 
 worship 131 
 
A 
 
 LETTER 
 
 TO 
 
 CHARLES BUTLER, BSQ: 
 
 to. be. 
 
 SIR; 
 
 I TAKE the liberty of addressing 
 
 you, not with the design of carrying on a more 
 direct and personal controversy than that which 
 has taken place between us, but because, slight 
 as is the notice which you have taken of the 
 contents of my Practical and Internal Evidence 
 against Catholicism, I feel that you have given 
 me occasion for personal remonstrance. But 
 this I must leave for another part of the present 
 Letter. 
 
 B 
 
2 MENTAL ALLEGIANCE OF 
 
 I. 
 
 Allow me to begin with a general remark, which 
 will be of use in the sequel. My book is directly 
 and professedly theological : if it glances upon the 
 political question which has so long occupied the 
 attention of the legislature and the public, it is 
 owing, not to any wish on my part to meddle 
 witli /siieh; fevfbjects, in this country ; but to the 
 :ltierc|ne* in/, which your representations of the 
 doctrines and moral temper of your Church 
 were suited to the political question, in your 
 answer to Mr. Southey. I have never charged, 
 nor do now mean to charge, you with wilful mis- 
 representation. I am ready to admit that you 
 believe the doctrines of your Church, in the form 
 which they assume in your works ; but, having 
 studied those doctrines under the control of the 
 head of your Church, and received them from 
 true ROMAN Catholic teachers, I felt it my duty 
 to declare, and I now repeat my declaration, that, 
 to the best of my knowledge, you, Sir, cannot be 
 taken as a fair specimen of the Church whose son 
 you still profess yourself. I am ready to acknow- 
 ledge, that it were most desirable that all your 
 
THE ROMAN CATHOLICS. 3 
 
 brethren over the world had become Roman 
 Catholics in no stricter sense than you appear 
 in your works. I wish your influence in your 
 Church were such that it might give authority to 
 your sentiments, and thoroughly blend them with 
 the creed of the whole religious community. But 
 you are only a spiritual subject in that community : 
 you, like every one of its members, profess spiri- 
 tual or mental obedience to the Church and its 
 acknowledged head : as long, therefore, as you 
 do not openly disown that intellectual vassalage, 
 we must, in respect to your faith, take you, not as 
 you are, but as you are bound to be. We must 
 take you as all nations are agreed to regard the 
 members of those political bodies with whom they 
 are at war. Many an individual Frenchman might, 
 during their long wars with this country, have 
 claimed the rights of friendship and hospitality 
 from England, and pleaded their views and set- 
 tled opinions of what their country was in duty 
 bound to Jo towards this. They might go far- 
 ther, and prove most convincingly, that their go- 
 vernment were acting unconstitutionally, and in 
 defiance of the French laws. They might declare 
 
 B2 
 
4 MENTAL ALLEGIANCE OF 
 
 their detestation of such conduct, and prove them- 
 selves staunch friends to the English interest ; 
 but as long as by their allegiance they remained 
 Frenchmen, and bound, in duty, to obey the 
 executive government of that nation, so long they 
 would be most justly exposed to be judged and 
 dealt with, not only as aliens, but as enemies. 
 Private sentiments are merged in the public de- 
 clarations of governments, and both you and your 
 friends are under a spiritual government in open 
 hostility with our religious establishment. You 
 deem it a hardship that Protestants should not 
 inquire your religious tenets from yourselves. 
 This is, in my opinion, a hardship of the same 
 nature as that which I have just described. You, 
 as an individual Roman Catholic, have no right 
 to shape your own creed. You are, on that point, 
 under a well known allegiance. Its being a spiri- 
 tual allegiance does not alter the case ; for belief 
 belongs to the mind or spirit, the very part of your 
 being which is under the absolute control of your 
 Church. 
 
 I wish you particularly to notice the word 
 spiritual, because I never have urged, I never 
 
THE ROMAN CATHOLICS. O 
 
 will urge, the temporal claims of your Church 
 against you. That distinction is the most fertile 
 source of confusion in this matter. I beg, there- 
 fore, to repeat what I have said elsewhere, that, 
 in my opinion, whenever the Church of Rome, or 
 its visible head, have claimed temporal power, it 
 has been as a direct consequence of their spiritual 
 privileges. Now, if the word spiritual has any 
 meaning, spiritual obedience must mean obedience 
 of the mind; and those who profess it, as they 
 hope for salvation, to the Pope and his church, 
 must renounce, by that act, every right to use the 
 powers of their mind on matters of faith and 
 morals, independently of their Church and its 
 head. 
 
 When the subject is examined upon this un- 
 questionable principle, the Roman Catholics, in 
 every part of the world, must be regarded as a 
 moral body, connected by mental or spiritual ties, 
 and subject to a central authority, which resides 
 in the city from which they take their distinctive 
 name of Roman: an authority which (whatever 
 the extent of its power may be) is visibly and 
 permanently exercised by the Pope. Can there 
 
6 MENTAL ALLEGIANCE OF 
 
 be a stricter analogy between such a body and 
 those which we call nations? 
 
 And shall we take the word of individual mem- 
 bers of this mental or spiritual nation of men 
 whose minds, in matters relating to religion, are as 
 much under a definite constitution, and a visible 
 authority, as men in their civil capacity are under 
 the different states of the earth shall we take 
 their word against the most solemn public decla- 
 rations of their acknowledged spiritual monarch 
 and his government? No. Let them begin by a 
 declaration of spiritual independence; let them 
 constitute themselves into one or more spiritual 
 bodies, free from their old spiritual allegiance, 
 and then we will most readily receive their decla- 
 rations on matters of faith and doctrine; but as 
 long as they profess themselves Roman Catholics, 
 as long as their spirits or minds are subjects, and 
 owe allegiance on every thing connected with 
 religious belief; they must submit to the necessity 
 of being treated, not as their individual views and 
 opinions in matters of religious belief may de- 
 serve, but according to those which have been 
 published to the world by the executive power 
 
THE ROMAN CATHOLICS. 7 
 
 (my language shall follow the analogy) of their 
 spiritual or mental community. 
 
 The necessity, Sir, of adhering to this method, 
 in order to ascertain the probable conduct of 
 members of your community in situations and 
 places of trust, where their political may clash 
 with their spiritual or mental duties, is the more 
 evident, as the two moral bodies of Protestant 
 and Roman Catholic Christians are not only in 
 the relation of two nations alien, but hostile to 
 each other. Would God that your spiritual 
 authority allowed us to bury this melancholy fact 
 in complete oblivion ! Would, that since we can- 
 not, as long as our creeds differ in so many 
 points, visibly form onefold, and one people, under 
 one shepherd, Christ our Saviour, our two great 
 portions of Christendom were allowed to look on 
 each other, as nations do, who, without blending 
 into one, live in amity and external peace ! 
 
 Unfortunately, the declaration of war which 
 your spiritual liege published against all Protes- 
 tants, at the time of the separation, has never 
 been recalled : we are still in the case of revolted 
 colonies, enjoying, thank God, our spiritual in- 
 
8 MENTAL ALLEGIANCE OF 
 
 dependence, but still described and styled as re- 
 bels, in the most solemn public acts of that autho- 
 rity to which you and your brother Romanists 
 are bound to submit your judgment upon these 
 subjects*. Can you then complain and think it 
 
 * " If any one should say, that those who have been baptized 
 are free from all the precepts of the Holy Church, either 
 written or delivered by tradition, so that they are not obliged 
 to observe them, unless they will submit to them of their own 
 accord, LET HIM BE ACCURSED !" Council of Trent, Sess. VII, 
 Can. VIII. 
 
 " ......So, even the wicked are within the Church; from 
 
 which (that is, what had been said before) it follows, that there 
 are only three sorts of men who are excluded from it the 
 heathen, the heretics and schismatics, and lastly, the excom- 
 municated. The heathen, because they never were in the 
 Church, nor did ever know it, or were made partakers of any 
 sacrament in the society of the Christian people : the here- 
 tics, however, arid the schismatics, though they indeed do not 
 belong in any other way to the Church, than deserters belong 
 to an army from which they ran away ; still it is not to be 
 denied that they are in the power of the Church, so that they 
 may be by her called to judgment, punished, and condemned 
 by anathema." Catechism of the Council of Trent, Rome, 
 1761, p. 84. 
 
 The original words of both passages will be found in another 
 part of this Letter. 
 
THE ROMAN CATHOLICS. 9 
 
 a hardship, that Protestants will not be satisfied 
 with your private declarations, unless, by renounc- 
 ing your spiritual allegiance, you become full 
 masters of your own minds men fully emanci- 
 pated, and sui juris, in intellect and judgment, 
 upon the matter in question? 
 
 Pardon me, Sir, if, without meaning any dis- 
 respect, I say, that neither you nor any collective 
 number of individuals of your Church no, not all 
 your bishops, both in England and Ireland can 
 settle this question by their comments or explana- 
 tions of the authentic acts of their supreme spi- 
 ritual authority. As well might some natives of 
 the new American states, still professing alle- 
 giance to Ferdinand VII and his successors (if 
 his resources to carry on any thing like a war 
 should be at an end before his determination not 
 to relinquish his claims), contend, that they had a 
 right to explain his inactivity into a recognition 
 of the independence of the revolted colonies. 
 " Renounce the authority of the Spanish King, 
 would the new Governments say, and we will 
 believe your professions in regard to us. But 
 though, out of respect to your individual character, 
 
10 MISTRANSLATION OF 
 
 we will not charge you with duplicity, it is im- 
 possible for us either to explain upon what prin- 
 ciples you act, or to see, without alarm, direct and 
 irresponsible power placed into your hands, while 
 you submit yourselves to our declared enemy." 
 
 But though I will not accuse you of deli- 
 berately lowering your standard of faith to pro- 
 mote the political views of your party, I cannot 
 shut my eyes to the numerous proofs afforded by 
 your works, that you have been your whole life 
 in the habit of reading your creed through the 
 coloured glass of party spirit. The Book of the 
 Roman Catholic Church must be inexplicable to 
 the unsophisticated divines of the Romish Church, 
 abroad; unless they are told, that every paragraph 
 in it, like the radii of a circle, converges to a seat 
 in Parliament. 
 
 II. 
 
 As a proof of the irresistible power of that bias 
 on your mind, I noticed a strange mistake in a 
 translation of a passage in the history of Paulus 
 
PAULUS .EMILIUS. 11 
 
 ./Emilius Veronensis : a mistake, which, if it could 
 not be explained by the irresistible bent of your 
 mind to evade every thing that can be said 
 against the most glaring errors of your Church, 
 would prove you grossly ignorant of the Latin 
 language. This, Sir, is a matter of fact, which 
 might be settled by referring the passage to any 
 well known and impartial Latin scholar. But in 
 the second edition of my work, I have given the 
 words of Antoninus, Bishop of Florence, the ori- 
 ginal historian, from whom Paulus ^Emilius took 
 the fact of the adoration which the Pope, Martin IV, 
 received from the Parnomitan legates, under the 
 appellation of the Lamb of God. 
 
 Perhaps you had not seen my second edition 
 when you took notice of my work: and as it is 
 probable that it has not found its way to your 
 library, I will take leave here to transcribe the 
 words of the two authors, that I may save you the 
 trouble of the search, and that the reader may 
 judge of your impartiality on questions of this 
 nature and tendency. 
 
 Ibietiam (in Chronic'is*} narratur quod, facia 
 
 * The original reference to this passage came to me, 
 through my friend Mr. Southey, from the Rev. Mr. Garnett, 
 
12 MISTRANSLATION OF 
 
 magna strage Galllcorum per Siculos, Panormi^ 
 tani cum aliis Siculis, antequam Hex Aragonum 
 venisset eis in adjutorium, miserunt oratores suos 
 viros religiosos ad summum Pontificem pro petenda 
 venia, timentes iras Karoli. Et eorum oratiofuit 
 hcEc : Agnus Dei, qui tollis peccata mundi, mise- 
 rere nobis, ter replicantes. Quibus in publico con- 
 sistorio, Papa respondit hczc solum : Ave rex 
 Judeorum dixerunt Judcei Christo; et dabant ei 
 alapas; ter et ipse hoc ipsum dicendo. Aliud res- 
 ponsum non habentes., abierunt contristati valde. 
 
 " It is besides related there (in the Chronicles) 
 that when the Sicilians had made that great mas- 
 sacre of the French, the Panormitans, before the 
 King of Arragon came to help them, sent some 
 holy men to the Pope as ambassadors, to ask his 
 pardon, in fear of Charles's anger. And their 
 
 curate of Blackburn in Lancashire, a gentleman of the most 
 extensive knowledge upon this subject, as well as upon every 
 other which I happened to touch upon, in a long conversation 
 which it was lately my good fortune to have with him. He 
 told me, that the Chronicles to which Antoninus refers are 
 those of one of the Villanis, who lived very near the event 
 of the adoration. It is there related simply, and without the 
 least qualification. 
 
PAULUS /EMILIUS. 13 
 
 speech was this : ' Lamb of God, who takest away 
 the sins of the world, have mercy upon us,' three 
 times repeated. To whom, in public consistory, 
 the Pope answered only these words, which he 
 also repeated three times : ' Hail, King of the Jews, 
 said the Jews to Christ, and they smote him with 
 their hands.' Receiving no other answer, they 
 went away very sorrowful." 
 
 The same fact is evidently mentioned, and with 
 the difference of a few ornamental words, in 
 almost the same terms, in the passage which, 
 when you had distorted in your translation, you 
 threw in the teeth of your adversary, as if you had 
 convicted him of a false assertion. I will also 
 copy the passage of Paulus .ZEmilius. 
 
 Cum apud Pontificem de hac consternatione 
 ageretur, a Panormitanis missos ad cum oratores, 
 viros sanctos, qui ad pedes illius strati, VELUT pro 
 ard hostidque Christum agnum Dei salutantes, ilia 
 ETIAM ex altar is my sterns verba supplices effaren- 
 tur Qui tollis peccata mundi, miserere nostri 
 Qui tollis peccata mundi) miserere nostri Qui 
 tollis peccata mundi, dona nobis pacem. Pontifi- 
 cem respondisse, Panormitanos agere quodfecissent, 
 
14 MISTRANSLATION OF 
 
 qui, cum Christum pulsarent, eundem regem Ju~ 
 deorum salutabant, re hostes,fando salverejubentes. 
 Here you made the historian say, that the am- 
 bassadors saluted Christ the Lamb of God, as 
 before an altar and the blessed sacrament, and by 
 this strange construction you wiped off from 
 your Church the stain of the impious act of idola- 
 try allowed and received by the Pope in person. 
 Yet when I had made it as clear as day, to every 
 impartial and competent judge of a Latin idiom, 
 that the fact was as Mr. Southey had stated it; 
 that is, that the ambassadors being prostrate at 
 the feet of the Pope, as if they were saluting 
 Christ the Lamb of God before the ara, and the 
 host, used EVEN those words from the mysteries 
 of the altar (the Mass), Agnus Dei, $c.: when 
 I had taken the trouble to prove from one of the 
 editions of Paulus j3Smilius, that there was a 
 convenient comma put in the wrong place of the 
 Latin sentence, as copied in your work; you still 
 have the confidence to give the public the follow- 
 ing answer. " Mr. Blanco White (page 31, and 
 note A, page 219) finds great fault with my trans- 
 lation of a passage in Paulus JEmilius Veronensis. 
 
PAULUS ^EMILIUS. 15 
 
 There is no end of verbal criticism. I still main- 
 tain the propriety of my translation. My placing 
 the original under the translation as by doing it 
 I furnished means for the instantaneous detection 
 of any error which might have found its way into 
 my translation, must satisfy every honourable 
 mind, that, if the error charged upon me exists, 
 it was unintentional*." 
 
 Your appeal to every honourable mind shall not 
 be lost upon mine. Strong must indeed be the 
 proof, that would force me to charge a man of 
 your age and reputation with deliberate dis- 
 honesty. What I charge you with, and I feel 
 confident that the world will convict you of, is, a 
 confirmed blindness to the clearest proofs of the 
 most glaring errors of your Church, a headlong 
 readiness to avail yourself of every subterfuge, 
 rather than admit the truth in such cases; and a 
 strong disposition to venture bold assertions, in a 
 style too well known to advocates, when you well 
 may suspect the character and design of the 
 witness at whose mouth you take them. 
 
 * Mr. Butler's Vindication, page 29. 
 
16 POLICY OF THE ENGLISH 
 
 Were not my powers of research limited by my 
 want of physical strength, I have a strong suspi- 
 cion that I should be able to find your mistransla- 
 tion and mispunctuation of the passage of Paulus 
 ./Emilius in some of the writers of your Church, 
 by whom you have more than once been led into 
 such awkward difficulties. You probably perceive 
 that I am on the point of noticing a most remark- 
 able pious fraud, which you have been obliged to 
 disclose in VI. 1, of your answer to my book. 
 
 III. 
 
 The readers of my Practical and Internal 
 Evidence will probably recollect, that in a note 
 to my second Letter I remonstrated on a very 
 important omission, discovered by me in your 
 translation of the Romanish Profession of Faith, 
 published by Pius IV, which is used without ex- 
 ception by all Roman Catholics, and is quoted by 
 yourself as the surest standard of the belief of 
 your Church. I requested my readers to com- 
 pare the last article in your translation of the 
 
ROMAN CATHOLIC PRIESTHOOD. 17 
 
 Creed with the original, and went through the 
 comparison in the following manner. 
 
 " Mr. Butler's translation : ' This true Catholic 
 faith, out of which none can be saved, which I 
 now freely profess, and truly hold, I, N. promise, 
 vow, and swear, most constantly to hold and pro- 
 fess the same, whole and entire, with God's assist- 
 ance, to the end of my life. Amen/ 
 
 " The Latin original: l Hanc veram Catholicam 
 fidem, extra quam nemo salvus esse potest, quam 
 in prsesenti sponte profiteer, et veraciter teneo, 
 eandem integram, et inviolatam, usque ad extre- 
 mum vitae spatium constantissime (Deo adjuvante) 
 retinere et confiteri, ATQUE A MEIS SUBDITIS, 
 
 VEL ILLIS QUORUM CURA AD ME IN MUNERE 
 MEO SPECTABIT, TENERI, DOCERI, ET PR^EDI- 
 CARI, QUANTUM IN ME ERIT, CURATURUM EGO 
 IDEM N. SPONDEO, VOVEO, AC JURO.' 
 
 " Now, the words in small capitals, omitted by 
 Mr. Butler, contain the very pith and marrow of 
 the strongest argument against the admissibility 
 of Roman Catholics to parliament. For if the 
 most solemn profession of their faith lays on every 
 
 one of her members, who enjoys a place of influ- 
 
 c 
 
18 POLICY OF THE ENGLISH 
 
 ence, the duty of 'procuring, that all under him, 
 by virtue of his office, shall hold, teach, and preach,' 
 the doctrines of the Roman Catholic Church, and 
 this under an oath and vow; how can such men 
 engage to preserve the ascendancy of the Church 
 of England in these realms?" 
 
 As far, Sir, as you are concerned, nothing can 
 be more satisfactory than the account you give of 
 the omission. Even before you had published 
 your statement, no one suspected you of so gross 
 a breach of good faith, though it was in favour 
 of your Church. But who could ever have be- 
 lieved it, if you yourself had not enabled every 
 man to prove it, that your Church, or that part of 
 it more immediately concerned in your spiritual 
 instruction, should have made you her dupe? 
 
 Let us hear your own account. 
 
 " Mr. Blanco White (you say*) informs his 
 readers, that he noticed my omission of the last 
 clause in the New Times. Had I seen the notice, 
 it would have put me upon inquiry; but Mr. 
 Blanco White's book conveyed to me the first 
 notice I had of his discovery." 
 
 * Page xxvii. 
 
ROMAN CATHOLIC PRIESTHOOD. 19 
 
 " My copy of the Creed (you continue) is a 
 transcription of that, which the late Dr. Challoner 
 prefixed to his l Grounds of the Catholic doc- 
 trine, as contained in the profession of faith pub- 
 lished by Pope Pius IV first published about 
 fifty years ago, and now in its twelfth edition. 
 Dr. Challoner also has prefixed it to his edition 
 of the Catholic Prayer Book, entitled the i Whole 
 Manual.' 
 
 " The words in question are omitted in both. 
 An English version of the profession of faith, 
 with the same omission, is also inserted in the 
 Ordo Admmistrandi Sacramenta, published under 
 the sanction of the Catholic Prelates in this 
 country, for the use of the English Catholic 
 
 mission." 
 
 Sir, this piece of information is most valuable, 
 and should never be lost sight of when the mem- 
 bers of your religious persuasion, who like yourself 
 are striving for political power, bring forward 
 any statement of the doctrines and inherent tem- 
 per of the Church of Rome. From my long and 
 intimate acquaintance with both, the fact, that 
 some Roman Catholics in this country scrupled 
 
 c 2 
 
20 POLICY OF THE ENGLISH 
 
 not to disguise the intolerance of their Church, 
 and soften down her most odious tenets, has been 
 evident to me, since the day when I first read a 
 report of the debates in Parliament upon what is 
 called the question of Catholic Emancipation. 
 My conviction of this fact has gained strength 
 every year. It had lately assumed the character 
 of a demonstration from the incomparable supple- 
 mental Letter of Dr. Phillpots to you, as well as 
 from the Digest of the evidence delivered before 
 the Committees of both Houses of Parliament*, a 
 work which every man, desirous of forming an 
 impartial and conscientious opinion upon the sub- 
 ject of Catholicism as connected with England and 
 Ireland, should make familiar to his mind. But 
 I never could hope to see the important fact 
 which I have just mentioned, proved upon evi- 
 dence afforded by you, Sir. I congratulate my- 
 self for having been the means of putting the 
 public in possession of your invaluable evidence. 
 We have, then, the following facts upon your 
 own authority. 
 
 * By the Rev. William M'Phelan, B. D. and the Rev. Mor- 
 timer O'Sullivan, A, M. 
 
ROMAN CATHOLIC PRIESTHOOD. 21 
 
 1st, That the clause of your most solemn Pro- 
 fession of Faith, which discloses the insolent and 
 encroaching spirit of your Church, has been so 
 industriously concealed in this country, that it was 
 unknown to you till my book brought it to your 
 notice. 
 
 2dly. That it is omitted in your Rituals, pub- 
 lished " under the sanction of the (Roman) 
 Catholic Prelates in this country, for the use 
 of the English (Roman) Catholic Mission :" that 
 is to say, for the use of that clergy, which are 
 employed by the Roman congregation De Pro- 
 paganda, for the purpose of converting this coun- 
 try to Popery. 
 
 3dly. That the clause is omitted in Dr. Chal- 
 loner's work, " Grounds of the Roman Catholic 
 doctrine, as contained in the profession of faith, 
 published by Pius IV:" in other words, that a 
 duty imposed by your Church, under the obliga- 
 tion of an oath and vow, is not noticed in a work, 
 the express and only object of which is to per- 
 suade the people of this country to embrace that 
 profession of faith. 
 
 Without losing sight of these facts, let us follow 
 up the chain of your evidence. Allow me, how- 
 
22 POLICY OF THE ENGLISH 
 
 ever, for that purpose, and under the assurance 
 that I do not mean to use any flippancy of man- 
 ner allow me, I repeat, to frame two questions 
 adapted to the answer which I am about to give 
 in your own words. 
 
 Is the last clause of the profession of faith of 
 Pius IV usually omitted in any other editions? 
 
 Mr. Butler's answer. " The passage in ques- 
 tion is inserted in the Profession of Faith in the 
 Bullarium of Cherubrinus, the Bullarium Mag- 
 num, and in a stereotype edition of the Canons 
 of the Council of Trent, recently published at 
 Paris. 
 
 " I am not apprised of any edition of the origi- 
 nal, or of any version of it, except Dr. Challoner's, 
 and the edition in the Ordo*^ from which it is 
 absent f." 
 
 Can you account for that omission? or are 
 we to understand, that the Roman Catholic 
 
 * Let the reader observe, that this ordo is that mentioned 
 in the preceding 1 passage of Mr. Butler's hook, as " published 
 under the sanction of the (Roman) Catholic prelates in this 
 country, for the use of the English (Roman) Catholic 
 mission." 
 
 t Vindication, page xxviii. 
 
ROMAN CATHOLIC PRIESTHOOD. 23 
 
 Clergy of this country disown and reject the 
 clause omitted in the books you have mentioned? 
 
 Mr. Butler. " Upon inquiry of those most 
 likely to be well informed upon the subject, of the 
 probable cause of Dr. Challoner's omission of the 
 passage in his editions of the Profession of Faith 
 (of) Pius IV, I understand that the clause is 
 always retained, when the oath is tendered to 
 priests, and always omitted when the oath is ten- 
 dered to the laity, and that the latter (for till 
 lately, priests were very seldom ordained in Eng- 
 land) being of most frequent use in this country, 
 Dr. Challoner naturally thought it was most pro- 
 per to publish the profession in that form*." 
 
 I regret, Sir, that it is not in my power to ob- 
 tain still an answer more, to a question, which 
 even the most unpractised man in the art of cross- 
 examination, would instantly draw from your last 
 answer. It is the following: You give us a 
 conjectural explanation of the omission by Dr. 
 Challoner. Dr. Challoner, you say, " naturally 
 thought it was most proper to publish the Profes- 
 
 * Vindication, page xxviii. 
 
24 POLICY OF THE ENGLISH 
 
 sion of Faith in that form" which is " of most fre- 
 quent use in this country." But can you tell us 
 how, and why the profession of your faith was 
 reduced to that form? Can you say who, for 
 what purpose, and by what authority, has cur- 
 tailed the Roman Catholic Profession of Faith 
 of most frequent use in this country ? 
 
 Sir, this is a question of the highest importance 
 to the Protestants, not only of this kingdom, but 
 of all parts of the world. It is of paramount 
 interest to every one who has the happiness of 
 having been born out of the spiritual grasp of 
 Rome, and of those, who, less fortunate, have 
 escaped for their lives, with the sore marks of 
 that grasp on their hearts it is of vital interest 
 to us all, to be acquainted with the details of that 
 policy, which is incessantly at work to destroy 
 our mental and moral liberty. We know too 
 well the temper of your Church, from the past; 
 we know her by her deeds of blood when she had 
 power; but it is more difficult to discover her 
 wiles, when she has grown weak, and artful in 
 proportion to her weakness. She formerly took 
 the field against heretics with all the pomp and 
 
ROMAN CATHOLIC PRIESTHOOD. 25 
 
 clamour of a battue prepared for an eastern 
 Prince ; now she glides silently, like the degraded 
 beings pursued by the game laws, setting her 
 gins and traps in the dark. Having in your 
 company stumbled upon one of these engines, we 
 must take it to pieces, and examine it in your 
 presence. 
 
 The first thing that strikes me is, that the most 
 sacred materials are not spared in your Church, 
 when they may be adapted to the purpose of en- 
 trapping the laity in these kingdoms. What, Sir ! 
 your most solemn profession of faith curtailed 
 and mangled, in order that the public may remain 
 in ignorance of a duty enforced by your infallible 
 authority under an oath and vow ! I thought, 
 indeed, that I knew to what extent casuistry was 
 allowed in order to forward the interests of the 
 Roman Catholic Church ; but I confess that I 
 never conceived, that any one Roman Catholic 
 prelate, much less a whole national body of 
 Roman Catholic prelates, would venture to tam- 
 per with such a document as the Profession of 
 Faith of Pius IV ! 
 
 Upon meeting, a short time ago, with these 
 
26 POLICY OF THE ENGLISH 
 
 words of Mosheim " It has long been known 
 
 o 
 
 from experience, that many are in the habit of 
 speaking differently from what they think; but 
 there is no kind of men, whose deeds differ more 
 widely from their intentions, than those who 
 craftily and cunningly watch over the interests 
 of the Bishop of Rome*" I confess they ap- 
 peared to me, though true, not quite accordant 
 with the sober and moderate tone of that learned 
 and candid writer. But how would he have ex- 
 pressed himself, if such a system of ecclesiastical 
 policy as that of the English Roman Catholic 
 clergy had fallen within his notice? Would 
 Heaven we might be able to explain the extra- 
 ordinary fact, which you have been forced to bring 
 to light in your own defence, by the supposition, 
 that the Roman Catholic prelacy in England had 
 gradually imbibed the milder spirit of the Church 
 
 * Usu dudum constat, aliud agere, aliud sentire multos 
 solere, nee ullum esse genus, in quo animus ab opere vehe- 
 mentius dissideat, quarn id, quod astute et callide, pro com- 
 modis antistitis Latinorura vigilat. Mosheim, Syntagma 
 Dissert. De Posnis Heret, p. 409, ed. Lipsia et Gorlitzii, 
 1733. 
 
ROMAN CATHOLIC PRIESTHOOD. 27 
 
 they oppose, and silently dropped that clause of 
 their Creed, which binds them to undermine, if 
 they cannot openly oppose, every Christian esta- 
 blishment which refuses to acknowledge their 
 head. But we cannot, either for their credit or 
 our own peace, make such a supposition for a 
 moment. " The clause is always retained when 
 the oath is tendered to priests, and always omitted 
 when the oath is tendered to the laity." No ! the 
 obligation of the Roman Catholic clergy in Eng- 
 land is " to procure that all under them, by virtue 
 of their office (and this office comprehends the 
 whole island, divided between the Roman Catholic 
 bishops by the Pope, who places them at the head 
 of his mission among us), shall hold, teach, and 
 preach, the doctrines of the Roman Catholic 
 Church." It is true, that they have so effectually 
 concealed this their bounden duty, that even a 
 layman of your eminence and learning in theolo- 
 gical matters among them, was ignorant of its 
 existence. With what view, then, has this policy 
 been resorted to ? Shall it be declared unchari- 
 table to say, that it has been done in order that 
 you might so boldly deny the spirit of intolerance 
 
28 POLICY OF THE ENGLISH 
 
 of active and direct intolerance of your 
 Church, and that, by removing this odious spot 
 from her face, the incautious Protestants should 
 allow themselves to be allured by her shows and 
 spiritual quackeries ? Shall I be accused of ma- 
 lice if I declare, that this desperate measure of 
 your clergy has been the result of the growing 
 political claims of their flocks ? 
 
 Can you otherwise explain why the clause of 
 your Creed most alarming to a Protestant Esta- 
 blishment, the clause, which, being the conclud- 
 ing words of the Profession of Faith, could be 
 omitted with the least danger of detection, is to 
 be found in every copy which you have consulted, 
 and is absent only from those which are in the 
 hands of the people in this country ? 
 
 " I am confident (such are your words, after 
 having stated the fact which I have been can- 
 vassing), that Mr. Blanco White is sufficiently 
 informed of the high character of Dr. Challoner 
 for learning, piety, and integrity, to attribute his 
 omission of the clause in question to any sinister 
 motive*." 
 
 * Vindication, p. xxix. 
 
RO3IAN CATHOLIC PRIESTHOOD. 29 
 
 It does not concern me, Sir, to judge Dr. Chal- 
 loner's motives ; I have only to do with the out- 
 ward act of which that divine stands convicted 
 upon your own evidence. He garbled the most 
 sacred document that ever issued from an autho- 
 rity which he believed to be infallible and divine ; 
 and no human ingenuity can acquit him of having 
 abetted a plan of indirect or negative deception, 
 not to disclaim, but conceal or disguise, an im- 
 portant part of his faith and duty : not to free the 
 Roman Catholic laity from the obligation of pro- 
 moting the exclusive sway of their faith and 
 Church system ; but to keep that obligation in 
 abeyance, to cherish it in the bosoms and con- 
 sciences of the clergy, ready to be instilled into 
 the minds of their spiritual subjects at the confes- 
 sional, whenever they should have it in their 
 power, by direct or indirect means, to forward 
 the interests of Popery. The high character of 
 the convict " for learning, piety, and integrity," 
 aifords an awful proof of the irresistible influence 
 of the Roman Catholic system to pervert the best 
 minds, and give them that degree of obliquity 
 which is required in the service of the wily set of 
 
30 POLICY OF THE ENGLISH 
 
 Italian priests, who lord it over more than one 
 half of Christendom, under the name and title of 
 the only true Church of Christ, the Mother and 
 Mistress of all churches. 
 
 In this case, I am persuaded, your forensic 
 dexterity can be of no avail. You must leave 
 either the moral character of Dr. Challoner, or 
 that of your own Church, in my hands, to be ex- 
 posed to the abhorrence of every mind that loves 
 truth in sincerity. 
 
 A most important clause of your creed having 
 been suppressed, a sinister motive must be 
 charged, either on Dr. Challoner or his spiritual 
 superiors. If he believed (as I am perfectly con- 
 vinced he did) that when acting in favour of his 
 Church the motive could not be sinister, what- 
 ever might be the object: that, for the purpose of 
 promoting her interests in these kingdoms; that, 
 with a view of placing members of her com- 
 munion in Parliament, where they might help 
 their clergy in rescuing their Protestant brethren 
 from the jaws of hell, by penning them up within 
 the Pope's fold, he might not only tamper with 
 the truth upon a plain matter of fact (as that of 
 
ROMAN CATHOLIC PRIESTHOOD. 31 
 
 delivering an authentic document as it is, or no- 
 ticing any necessary or convenient alteration), but 
 that he was allowed, though with a trembling 
 hand, to stop the mouth of his own divine oracle, 
 and stifle part of the words of its most solemn 
 answer ; then, let the world learn to what degree 
 the best and most pious minds lose sight of the 
 first principles of right and wrong, when they 
 fully give themselves up to the peculiar doctrines 
 of the Romish Church. 
 
 It would be not uninteresting to know, whether 
 the suppression of the last clause of the creed of 
 Pius IV, when that profession is administered to 
 laymen in this kingdom, has been resorted to 
 with or without the approbation and consent of 
 the Court of Rome. But we cannot expect to 
 be indulged every day with such discoveries as 
 it has been my good luck to bring about. What 
 we do know is most valuable every way ; and in 
 none, I hope, more really so, than in helping me 
 to answer your paragraph on the Roman Catholic 
 doctrine of Exclusive Salvation *. 
 
 * VI, 5, p. xxxiv. 
 
32 ROMANIST DOCTRINE 
 
 IV. 
 
 Suppose, Sir, that a man had, at some period, 
 attempted your life, and solemnly declared that 
 he would never rest till he destroyed you ; that 
 the same man, having grown weak, and rather 
 helpless, without procuring a complete recon- 
 ciliation, asked you to admit him within the doors 
 of your house ; and that, while, from an excess of 
 good nature and liberality, you were doubting 
 whether to admit him or not, you perceived that 
 he had carefully concealed in his bosom the 
 dagger, which in former days he wore openly, as 
 destined to pierce your heart ; would you listen to 
 an elaborate declaration on his part, intended to 
 show that the dagger could never hurt you? Sir, 
 the very act of concealing the weapon from you, 
 would instinctively prove to you, that it was 
 aimed at your breast. No commentary, or ex- 
 position, can convey the sense and tendency of 
 your doctrine of Exclusive Salvation so clearly 
 as the anxiety of your bishops to keep from the 
 knowledge of the British public the authorized 
 enforcement of its practical consequences. What 
 
OF EXCLUSIVE SALVATION. 33 
 
 weight can the hair-splitting distinctions of the 
 author of " Charity and Truth," and the shame- 
 faced declaration of the Irish titular bishops, 
 lately published upon this point, have against 
 that recognition of the unrelenting spirit of in- 
 tolerance consecrated by their Church, which we 
 have received from the concealment of part of 
 their creed, contrived by your English Prelates ? 
 
 But let us examine both your favourite ex- 
 position, and that more recent one of the Irish 
 Romanist Prelacy. Before we proceed, let us, 
 however, pause to consider the words with which 
 you usher in your quotation. " Permit me (you 
 say to the friend you address in your introduc- 
 tion) to state distinctly, from an authority that 
 cannot be questioned, the doctrine of the Roman 
 Catholics, respecting Exclusive Salvation in their 
 Church, in opposition to the representation which 
 Mr. Blanco White gives of it (p. 61), and in other 
 parts of his work." Unquestionable authority ! 
 Have you forgotten the long string of restric- 
 tions which you laid upon Protestant writers, 
 whenever they should attempt to attribute any 
 
34 ROMANIST DOCTRINE 
 
 doctrine to your Church ? I would resquest you 
 to cast your eye over the ninth and the two sub- 
 sequent pages of your first edition of the Book of 
 the Roman Catholic Church. I should like to 
 know upon what equitable principle we are to 
 be prevented charging your Church with opinions 
 and practices which she notoriously encourages 
 in the writings and conduct of her members ; and 
 be also obliged, whenever it suits you, to take the 
 statements of a private writer, or even the declara- 
 tions of your Irish Bishops, as " unquestionable 
 authority." Never forget, Sir, I entreat you, 
 that neither you, nor your writers, nor your 
 bishops, have any judgment of their own on these 
 matters. You are all subjects ; all minors. 
 
 But we will hear your unquestionable autho- 
 rity, as well as the declaration of the Irish Ro- 
 manist hierarchy. The former states, that any 
 person, by whomsoever baptized, " receives, on 
 his baptism, justifying grace and justifying 
 faith." " That he loses the former by the com- 
 mission of any mortal sin." " That he loses the 
 latter by the commission of a mortal sin against 
 
OF EXCLUSIVE SALVATION. 35 
 
 faith, but does not lose it by the commission of a 
 mortal sin of any other kind." " That without 
 such wilful ignorance or wilful error, as amounts 
 to a crime in the eye of God, a mortal sin 
 against faith is never committed." " And that, 
 except in an extreme case, no individual is justi- 
 fied in imputing, even in his own mind, this 
 criminal ignorance or criminal error to'any other 
 individual*." This is all very kind and charitable. 
 But, before I proceed, I cannot help adverting to 
 a few omissions in this luminous declaration. I 
 allude, Sir, to the author's silence in respect to 
 the rule by which we are to be found guilty or 
 not guilty, of that kind and degree of ignorance 
 and error, which should be considered wilful, and 
 amounting to a crime in the eye of God? I 
 should like also to know if your unquestionable 
 authority engages,- that your Church shall hence- 
 forward reserve the decision of that point to God 
 alone. If such be the fact, I trust, that for our 
 comfort and peace, we shall soon receive from 
 Rome a corrected edition of the council of Trent, 
 
 * Vindication, p. xxxv. y | IO - 
 
 D 2 
 
36 ROMANIST DOCTRINE 
 
 leaving out the decrees which I have above 
 quoted, and which, till they are expunged by the 
 Head of your Church, I shall take every oppor- 
 tunity of keeping before the eyes of my fellow- 
 Protestants. " If any one should say, that those 
 who have been baptized are free from all the 
 precepts of the Holy Church, either written or 
 delivered by tradition, so that they are not ob- 
 liged to observe them, unless they will submit to 
 them of their own accord, let him be accursed" 
 " If any one should say, that these baptized chil- 
 dren, when they grow up, are to be asked whether 
 they will confirm what their godfathers promised 
 in their name; and that, if they say they will not, 
 they are to be left to their own discretion, and 
 not to be forced, in the mean time, into the ob- 
 servance of a Christian life by any other punish- 
 ment than that of keeping them from the recep- 
 tion of the eucharist and other sacraments, till 
 they repent; let him be accursed*." " Besides, 
 in order to check petulant minds, the same most 
 Holy Synod declares, that no person, by trusting 
 
 * Section VII, Can. VIII, et XIV, de Baptismo. 
 
OF EXCLUSIVE SALVATION. 37 
 
 his own judgment, upon things of faith and 
 morals, relating to the edification of the Christian 
 doctrine, and wresting the Holy Scriptures to his 
 own meaning, dare to interpret those Scriptures 
 against that sense which the Holy Mother 
 Church (to whom it belongs to judge of the true 
 sense and interpretation of them) has holden and 
 does hold, or even against the unanimous sense 
 of the Holy Fathers : though such an interpreta- 
 tion should not be intended ever to be brought to 
 light. Whoever contravenes, let him be pre- 
 sented by the Ordinaries *, and be punished with 
 the penalties established by lawf." I am sorry, 
 indeed, to trouble you with quotations which want 
 the attraction of novelty ; but I clearly perceive 
 that they cannot be sufficiently repeated to pre- 
 serve them in your recollection. Where there exist 
 an authority acknowledged by you to be divine 
 
 * The Ordinaries at the time of this decree were the 
 bishops, where there was no Inquisition established ; and the 
 Inquisition with the Bishops, in places where that tribunal 
 existed. 
 
 f Decretum Cone. Trident, de editione et usu sacrorum 
 librorum, Sess, IV. 
 
38 ROMANIST DOCTRINE 
 
 and infallible, why should we, for the sake of 
 display go to councils of a remoter date than that 
 of Trent? Why should we enter into a historical 
 controversy with you and your friends, whom we 
 know to be most ready to draw us into doubts and 
 questions about genuineness of canons, infallible 
 and fallible decrees, parts that are approved by 
 the Pope, and parts which want his sanction? 
 Here we may proceed more safely. 
 
 By the bye, the mention of Trent reminds me 
 of two other passages which must also be ex- 
 punged, when the Church of Rome shall agree 
 with your unquestionable authority. They are 
 found in the Catechism of your last and greatest 
 council, that pure source of knowledge in these 
 matters to which you refer us*. The definition 
 of a heretic, in that Catechism, does not quite 
 agree with the elaborate description of the same 
 being, by your author of " Charity and Truth." 
 " He (says your Catechism), who, disregarding 
 
 * A wise method of ascertaining this (whether a principle 
 has been propounded as an article of faith by the Church), 
 would be to read the " Catechism of the Council of Trent." 
 Book of the Roman Catholic Church, page 10, first edition. 
 
OF EXCLUSIVE SALVATION. 39 
 
 the authority of the Church, defends impious 
 opinions with a pertinacious mind, is to be held 
 a heretic." Hczreticus dicendus est...qui> EC- 
 clesice auctoritate neglecta, impias opiniones per- 
 tinaci ammo tuetur *. 
 
 Now this is clear and practical. The Church, 
 in the language of the Catechism, is that of 
 Rome: impious opinions, are those condemned 
 by her : they are to be disbelieved upon her autho- 
 rity ; and he who does not yield to that authority 
 after a certain time is pertinacious, and conse- 
 quently a heretic. Why, Sir, should any one of 
 your persuasion, any one who thinks himself 
 justified in keeping up an eternal clamour and 
 complaint of oppression and degradation, and 
 wishes the world to regard his party as suffering 
 a protracted martyrdom for conscience sake, and 
 the love of his Roman Catholic faith: why 
 should any such man take liberties with the de- 
 clarations of his Church, obscure her sense, and 
 disfigure her decrees? Shall I repeat the well 
 known declaration concerning the spiritual state 
 
 * Catech. ad Parodies, Ronue 1761, p. 80. 
 
40 ROMANIST DOCTRINE 
 
 of Protestants,j*and the treatment which your 
 Church prepares for us, heretics, as both appear 
 in the same article of her Catechism ? I will, 
 Sir ; for it is necessary to do so, in order to show 
 how truth is husbanded and economized among the 
 Roman Catholics, when they appear before the 
 English public. You yourself, Sir, shall be shown 
 to be no spendthrift of her stores. 
 
 " Nor, indeed (says your spiritual guide), do 
 they (the heretics) any more belong to the 
 Church, than deserters belong to the army from 
 which they fell away. Yet it is not to be denied, 
 that they are in the power of the Church, so that 
 they may be called by her to trial, punished, and 
 condemned by anathema." Neque illi magis ad 
 Ecdesiam spectant, quam transfugce ad exerci- 
 tum pertineant, a quo defecerunt. Non negan- 
 dum tamen, quin in Ecclesice potestate sint, ut 
 qui ab ea in judicium vocentur, puniantur, et 
 anathemate damnentur *. 
 
 Be good enough, Sir, before we proceed, to 
 mark the points which we find settled by an au- 
 
 * Ib. p. 84. 
 
OF EXCLUSIVE SALVATION. 41 
 
 thority to which you refer us, and which you 
 cannot decline without reducing your Catholicism 
 to a mere political tie a name which secures 
 you the good will of a party. First, We have 
 found (what I had most distinctly stated in my 
 Evidence) that it is not error, but pertinacity, 
 which, in the opinion of your Church, constitutes 
 a heretic. Secondly, That such pertinacity con- 
 sists in neglecting the authority of the Church. 
 Thirdly, That persons who have received Christian 
 baptism are declared not to be free to reject the 
 precepts of the Church ; that Church, which, in 
 your Profession of Faith, is declared to be under 
 the Pope as its head, and proclaimed to be the only 
 true Church. Fourthly, That such as use their 
 own discretion on that point, should not only be 
 separated from the use of your Church's sacra- 
 ments, but also punished otherwise. Fifthly, 
 That heretics are considered in the same charac- 
 ter as deserters from an army, and that the Church 
 has a right to bring them to trial and punish 
 them. Sixthly, and lastly, That no Roman 
 Catholic is allowed to be a judge of the sense of 
 
42 ROMANIST DOCTRINE 
 
 Scripture, but that the declaring that sense be- 
 longs to the Romanist Church. 
 
 It is difficult, indeed, after having settled these 
 points to observe, with a proper degree of for- 
 bearance, the mixture of truth and evasion the 
 artful combination of openness and mental re- 
 servation, which every man of sense and candour 
 must perceive in the Vllth article of the De- 
 claration, lately published by your Irish Prelates. 
 " Catholics hold, that, in order to attain salvation, 
 it is necessary to belong to the true Church*; and 
 that heresy, or a wilful and obstinate opposition 
 to revealed truth f as taught in the Church of 
 Chris tj excludes from the kingdom of heaven. 
 They are not, however, obliged to believe, that 
 all those are wilfully and obstinately attached to 
 error, who, having been seduced into it by others, 
 
 * Why not say openly, the Church of Rome, which is the 
 true meaning, according to their Profession of Faith ? 
 
 f This is not true : it is opposition to the Church which 
 constitutes the heretic. See Definition of a Heretic in the 
 passage of the Trent Catechism above quoted. 
 
 \ Observe the evasion by which the preceding false state- 
 ment is palliated. 
 
OF EXCLUSIVE SALVATION. 43 
 
 or who, having imbibed it from their parents, seek 
 the truth with a cautious solicitude, disposed to 
 embrace it when sufficiently proposed to them ; 
 but leaving such persons to the righteous judg- 
 ment of a merciful God, they feel themselves 
 bound to discharge towards them, as well as to- 
 wards all mankind, the duties of charity and of 
 social life." 
 
 Sir, I cannot conceive how a man of unso- 
 phisticated honesty can read the latter half of the 
 above declaration, without blushing for those who 
 recognize the Church, whose mixed spirit of 
 casuistry and intolerance appears in it. That 
 Protestants are placed, by the above declaration, 
 in the same spiritual rank with pagans ; that in 
 respect to God and salvation they are left, as all 
 mankind) is obvious. Now, I infinitely prefer 
 the bold open insults which your Church, when 
 she felt strong, hurled against the Protestants, 
 to the mean and insidious smoothness of her 
 representatives in these parts. 
 
 Seduced Protestants Protestants by inheri- 
 tance, disposed to embrace the truth, i. e. Popery, 
 when sufficiently proposed to them, are left to the 
 
44 ROMANIST DOCTRINE 
 
 righteous judgment of a merciful God, Pro- 
 testants by their own conviction, like myself, 
 cannot, of course, expect to be consigned to those 
 mercies by these tolerant and mild pastors. But, 
 who was ever anxious to obtain their declaration 
 upon this point ? What Protestant would have 
 troubled himself about their private sentiments, 
 as to the individual future fate of those who differ 
 from them in doctrine ? Sir, you must confess, that 
 your prelates have avoided the question con- 
 cerning your doctrine of Exclusive Salvation, 
 which alone can be of any interest to the Protestant 
 public, in regard to the Catholic Question, i. e. 
 the admission of Catholics to Parliament. I will 
 say to you, what a divine of your own persuasion 
 urged, with much less reason, when he was 
 pressing an English divine to state, explicitly, 
 whether he allowed salvation in the Roman 
 Catholic Communion. " And it will be here 
 expected that he perform these things, as a 
 man who professeth learning should do ; not fly- 
 ing from questions which concern things as they 
 are considered in their own nature, to accidental 
 or rare circumstances of ignorance, incapacity, 
 
OF EXCLUSIVE SALVATEON. 45 
 
 want of means to be instructed, erroneous consci- 
 ence, and the like, which, being very various and 
 different, cannot be well comprehended under any 
 general rule. And therefore when, for example, 
 he answers to our demand, whether he hold that 
 Catholics may be saved, or whether their pre- 
 tended errors be fundamental and damnable, he 
 is not to change the state of the question, and 
 have recourse to ignorance, and the like, but to 
 answer concerning the errors, being considered 
 what they are apt to be in themselves, and as 
 they are neither increased nor diminished by 
 accidental circumstances*." 
 
 I will not stop to take much notice of the ex- 
 pression truth sufficiently proposed, by which the 
 bishops avoid clashing with the definition of perti- 
 nacious error given by their Church. We are to 
 have the truth proposed, not proved to our satis- 
 faction ; proposed sufficiently, not according to 
 our judgment, but that of the Church herself. 
 Sir, that was exactly the method pursued by the 
 
 * Preface to " Charity Maintained" in Chillingworth's 
 Religion of Protestants. London, 1638. 
 
46 SECURITY OATHS. 
 
 Inquisition, which you so cordially detest. But of 
 this presently. 
 
 As we do not fear the consequences of Roman 
 Catholic doctrines relating to our salvation, in re- 
 gard to the Divine judgment, the Protestants would 
 not trouble themselves about them, except with a 
 view to convince you, if possible, of their anti- 
 christian uncharitableness. What we want to 
 ascertain from you and your bishops is, whether 
 you are disposed to disclaim, that the Protestant 
 systems of Christianity, in themselves, lead to eter- 
 nal perdition ? If you will not deny this, and yet 
 engage to take an oath to protect our Church Esta- 
 blishment, in case of being elected a member of 
 parliament; we shall be at a loss to explain such 
 a glaring practical contradiction. 
 
 V. 
 
 And here allow me to take notice of the dis- 
 dainful tone in which you represent me as having 
 suffered a miserable deception, with regard to the 
 " support which (some of the Romanist priest- 
 
SECURITY OATHS. 4? 
 
 hood) seem to give to oaths so abhorrent from the 
 belief of their Church, as must precede the admis- 
 sion of members of that Church into Parliament." 
 Such are my words; the following are those 
 by which you comment upon them. " These are 
 the oaths of Supremacy, and those against Tran- 
 substantiation and Popery. Here Mr. Blanco 
 White has been miserably deceived." Pardon 
 me, Sir, if I retort by saying, here Mr. Charles 
 Butler has shown a miserable oscitancy in reading 
 the book he meant to answer. Had you paid any 
 attention to the next period, if not to the whole 
 tenor of the argument, you would not have be- 
 trayed this first indication of the suppressed ill 
 humour, which seems to have troubled you while 
 reading my book. "If (said I) there be con- 
 scientious believers among them (the Roman 
 Catholic Clergy), which I will not doubt for a 
 moment, and they are not forced into silence, as I 
 suspect it is done in similar cases, I feel assured 
 that they will earnestly deprecate and condemn 
 all engagements on the part of the Roman Catho- 
 lics to support and defend the Church of England. 
 Such were the oaths of which I spoke. I beg 
 
48 SECURITY OATHS. 
 
 you to examine the whole passage over again, and 
 to be more cautious in future of showing yourself 
 so careless a reader, or so desirous to meet with 
 a blundering adversary, as to conceive that I could 
 say, that a Roman Catholic might take the oath 
 against popery, and still retain that name. 
 
 Since, however, you have obliged me to allude 
 to the various oaths of security which have been 
 proposed, and which, I believe, are deemed ne- 
 cessary by every one of your Protestant advocates, 
 who is not perfectly indifferent to the interests of 
 his religion ; I will propose the sketch of a clause 
 in that oath, which might, I conceive, be used as 
 a test of the real and practical tendency of that 
 doctrine of exclusive salvation, on which you and 
 your Irish bishop are so fertile in modifications 
 and distinctions. The clause I would propose is 
 this. 
 
 And I make oath, that though I profess the 
 Roman Catholic religion, I will, in the exercise of 
 my parliamentary duties, promote the welfare of the 
 Protestant Religion, as by law established. And 
 I declare upon my oath, that Ifeel completely at 
 liberty, in my conscience, to promise and swear 
 
SECURITY OATHS. 49 
 
 that I will support the religion by law established 
 in this realm, because I do not believe that Pro- 
 testantism, in itself, is a wicked or antichristian 
 system, or that Protestants are, by the simple 
 circumstance of their disowning the authority of 
 the Church of Rome on matters of faith, excluded 
 from any of the privileges and advantages of true 
 Christians. I moreover promise upon the same 
 oath, that if at any time I should change my opi- 
 nion upon this subject, and feel persuaded that the 
 Church of England is not a true Church of Christ, 
 and that Protestantism is a system pernicious to 
 the souls of men, I will immediately resign my seat 
 in Parliament. 
 
 I do not pretend, Sir, to any skill in preparing 
 the draft of a bill upon this subject ; and there 
 may be something very incorrect in the style and 
 wording of my clause. But I hope that it is suffi- 
 cient to meet your evasions. Can you, as a Ro- 
 man Catholic, bind yourself with the above oath ? 
 Then your doctrine of exclusive salvation will 
 give us no umbrage. If you cannot, you afford 
 us a direct proof that we have not mistaken the 
 
 K 
 
50 SECURITY OATHS. 
 
 danger to the Protestant liberties of this country 
 with which that doctrine is pregnant. 
 
 It is probable, however, that you will contrive 
 such an answer, as that which I find among your 
 remarks on my book, to the question which I sub- 
 stituted for those which were addressed, with the 
 approbation of Mr. Pitt, to the Roman Catholic 
 universities. The name of that great man pre- 
 sented to you the opportunity of throwing over 
 me one of those small and transient clouds, by 
 which, I find, you rather frequently endeavour to 
 place your adversary in an unfavourable light. I 
 notice it, Sir, because the moment approaches 
 when I shall show that you are a polite, but not a 
 fair or generous antagonist. " Mr. Blanco White 
 (you say) expresses his dissatisfaction with the 
 questions proposed to the foreign universities, 
 and with their answers. As the questions satisfied 
 Mr. Pitt, there certainly is reason to presume that 
 they were framed properly." Here you wish to 
 gain over the reader, by making him feel indig- 
 nant at my implied presumption in trying to cor- 
 rect Mr. Pitt. Such arts, Sir, are miserable. 
 
SECURITY OATHS. 51 
 
 Mr. Pitt's extraordinary powers of mind could 
 not give him that practical and intimate acquaint- 
 ance with the tendency of the Roman Catholic 
 tenets, and the legerdemain tricks by which that 
 tendency is concealed, which I owe, not to any 
 peculiar powers, not to any studies of which I 
 can feel proud, but to the misfortune of having 
 been subjected to a long and elaborate Roman 
 Catholic education. The individual who lately 
 gave us the interesting account of his early capti- 
 vity among the North American Indians, might 
 be listened to, with advantage, by the most highly 
 gifted man in Europe, in case of danger from 
 those tribes ; and yet, in spite of that honour, he 
 might well lament the great waste of time, the 
 loss of opportunities to improve his natural 
 powers, the hardships and the sufferings by 
 which he acquired the knowledge, for the sake 
 of which much greater men than himself would 
 now lend him an attentive ear. 
 
 E2 
 
52 MR. BUTLER'S EVASIONS 
 
 VI. 
 
 But I will, by your leave, return to my former 
 question and your answer. 
 
 " Can the POPE, in virtue of what the Roman 
 Catholics believe his divine authority, command 
 the assistance of the faithful in checking the pro- 
 gress of heresy, by any means not likely to 
 produce loss or danger to the Roman Catholic 
 Church; and can that CHURCH acknowledge 
 the validity of any engagement to disobey the 
 Pope in such cases?" " My answer (you say) 
 shall be short and explicit; and will, I trust, be 
 satisfactory." 
 
 Your answer, Sir ? Was it not from a strong 
 suspicion that the political bias of most English 
 and Irish Roman Catholics, without weakening 
 their disposition to obey the authority of their 
 Pope and Church, had led them to misunder- 
 stand (I will not, when speaking in general, say, 
 misrepresent) their doctrines and decisions ? 
 
 Your answer ? It was to give weight to such 
 answers that the expedient of consulting the 
 foreign universities was thought necessary. I 
 
ON THE POWER OF THE POPE. 53 
 
 certainly did not propose my question to have 
 it answered by you ; for I could easily conjecture 
 how a Roman Catholic layman, living under the 
 protection of the English Constitution, and wanted 
 as a stalking-horse by your clergy, might evade 
 the most searching question in writing, and under 
 the certainty of not having another instantly urged 
 to bring out the whole truth. But let us, never- 
 theless, hear your answer. 
 
 " The Pope may, in virtue of what the Roman 
 Catholics believe his divine authority, command 
 the assistance of the faithful in checking the pro- 
 gress of heresy, by preaching and teaching, in the 
 manner prescribed in the Gospel, BUT BY NO 
 OTHER MEANS: and the Roman Catholics may 
 acknowledge the validity of any engagement to 
 disobey the Pope, in any case in which he should 
 command them to check heresy, BY ANY OTHER 
 MEANS than of preaching and teaching, in the 
 manner prescribed by the Gospel*." 
 
 I really suspect, Sir, that any one who atten- 
 tively examines this answer must think that you 
 
 * Vindication, page xxxvii. 
 
54 MR. BUTLER'S EVASIONS 
 
 have erected yourself into a pope of your own 
 Pope. What right have you, as a Roman Ca- 
 tholic, to explain the Gospel to the head of that 
 Church, " to which it belongs to judge of the sense 
 of the Holy Scriptures*." Are you disposed to 
 declare, that your Roman Catholic Church 
 your Council of Trent, where she was visible 
 and audible for the last time misunderstood the 
 Gospel, and acted against its precepts, when she 
 passed the decrees about forcing baptized persons 
 into obedience to her written and traditional pre- 
 cepts, by other punishments than that of excom- 
 munication ? Read again, I entreat you, that and 
 the other decrees which I have copied a few 
 pages before; and if you are disposed to deny 
 them, then do not call yourself any more a Ro- 
 man Catholic; do not help to keep up the awful 
 struggle which every honest man laments in this 
 kingdom; and give your political ambition any 
 other colouring but that of attachment to the 
 faith of your Church. 
 
 After dwelling so long on the character of your 
 
 * Council of Trent, ubi supra. 
 
ON THE POWER OF THE POPE. 55 
 
 arguments, the Tart with which you avoid the 
 mention of the Church in your answer to my 
 question, gives me little or no surprise. I ask, 
 " can that Church (meaning the indefinite being 
 to which you attribute supreme authority over 
 your minds and consciences) acknowledge the 
 validity of any engagements to disobey the Pope 
 in such cases, i. e. of engagements not to check 
 the progrees of heresy. You answer, the Roman 
 Catholics may acknowledge the validity of any 
 engagement, &c. Sir, I did not word my ques- 
 tion at random. I framed it with all the caution 
 suggested by the idea, too familiar to my mind, 
 of a Roman Catholic University, by the idea 
 of the broad gap which an assembled faculty 
 of Roman Catholic Divines can make between 
 a downright falsehood and the simple truth, 
 when the interests of their Church are con- 
 cerned. I knew that THEY would not dare to 
 deny that the Church has solemnly declared the 
 nullity of such engagements. THEY are too well 
 acquainted with the xvith Canon of the third 
 Council of Lateran, which says : " Nor let the 
 saying of any one, that he is bound by oath to 
 
56 THE ROMAN CATHOLIC CHURCH 
 
 keep the constitution of his own Church, oppose 
 our decree. Oaths, which oppose the utility of 
 the Church and the constitutions of the Fathers, 
 should rather be called perjuries than oaths/' 
 Nee nostrum Constitutionem impediat si forte 
 aliquiS) ad conservandam ecclesice suce consuetu- 
 dinem, juramento se dicat adstrictum. Non 
 enim dicenda sunt jur amenta sed potlus perjuria, 
 quce contra utilitatem ecclesiasticam et sanctorum 
 patrum vemunt instituta. 
 
 The foreign divines would on such an occasion 
 be fully aware of the increased force of that de- 
 claration, when applied, not to contending inte- 
 rests of a particular Church and that which 
 assumes the title of universal; but between the 
 heretical Church of England and the (in their 
 opinion) only true Church of Rome. I am far 
 from denying, I indeed actually acknowledged, 
 the probability that the foreign universities would 
 have evaded my question ; but they certainly 
 would have evaded it by means of a more respect- 
 able sophism than that of slipping into the answer, 
 the expression Roman Catholics, instead of Roman 
 Catholic Church. 
 
AN INDEFINITE BEING. 57 
 
 1. I have often dwelt upon the vague and 
 indefinite signification of Roman Catholic Church, 
 because, I believe, it involves one of the most 
 powerful arguments that can be presented to a 
 thinking and accurate mind, against that system 
 of Christian Faith ; the most boasted excellence 
 of which, among its supporters, is the comfort 
 and certainty that those, who, on religious matters, 
 submit their understandings and consciences to 
 the Church of Rome, derive from her infallibility. 
 In this light, every one of the numerous evasions 
 to which you and the Irish bishops have resorted, 
 when the decision of such canons as that which 
 I last mentioned were brought to prove the doc- 
 trines which you are pledged to support; is an 
 irrefragable proof of the delusion upheld under 
 the name of their infallible oracle. But the 
 difficulty of ascertaining the precise circumstances 
 in which the organs of Church infallibility cannot 
 err, as it shows the vanity of the Roman Catholic 
 system, in regard to the security it promises to 
 the conscience ; so, when the conscience is to be 
 worked upon by the fears of disobeying the in- 
 fallible oracle, the very uncertainty, as to its pre- 
 
58 THE ROMAN CATHOLIC CHURCH 
 
 i 
 
 cise seat and nature, places increased power in 
 the hands of those who may choose to employ the 
 name of the Church for the furtherance of their 
 private, or party designs.. The Roman Catholic 
 Church is a real Proteus, when she wishes to 
 withhold her oracles. She is now the Pope ; she 
 is next a council ; by and by, she is the Pope and 
 council ; presently the Pope and the council, as 
 it happened at Basil, break into two halves, 
 one orthodox and infallible, the other heretical 
 and deceiving. But these transmutations, like 
 those of her fabled original, happen only when 
 she finds herself in bonds, out of which she wishes 
 to escape. Whenever it suits her purposes, the 
 transformations are very different; for you will 
 find her speaking her infallible oracles through 
 the mouth of every priest, and claiming obedience 
 from the faithful, under the cowl of every monk, 
 " black, white, or grey." 
 
 2. There is, however, one oracle, which 
 English Protestants absolutely require, and must 
 obtain, before Rome is allowed to range unre- 
 strained in their cabinets and Parliament. She 
 must tell them plainly, that she has no right to 
 
AN INDEFINITE BEING. 59 
 
 interfere directly or indirectly, secretly or openly, 
 with the existence and prosperity of their Church; 
 and I cannot, indeed, conclude this point, without 
 urging on every English Protestant, the necessity 
 of adhering to the direction given in the case 
 of the Pagan Proteus : 
 
 " Sed quanto ille magis formas se vertet in omnes 
 Tanto, nate, magis contende tenacia vincla, 
 Donee talis erit, mutato corpora, qualem 
 Videris, incepto tegeret cum lumina somno." 
 
 " But thou, the more he varies forms, beware 
 To strain his fetters with a stricter care, 
 Till, tiring all his arts, he turns agen 
 To his true shape, in which he first was seen." 
 
 Let not go your hold : believe no definition of 
 Rome, as long as she is transformed into 
 English or Irish bishops, or barristers. She must 
 give the oracle in the same shape which she had 
 when she slept in security, the acknowledged 
 queen of all other Churches. Let the Pope 
 speak as he used to do, in his own person and 
 original shape; in that shape by which he 
 was known at the time when he doomed us to 
 
60 THE ROMAN CATHOLIC CHURCH 
 
 perdition ; and do not allow his Irish prelates to 
 bewilder you between their assertions and those 
 of former popes and councils *. 
 
 * Of all the evasions, which ever were resorted to by cun- 
 ning, none can equal one mentioned in a note of that most in- 
 teresting work, La Vie de Scipion de Ricci. The fact is stated 
 on the authority of a book, intitled " Sentimenti di Gian Vin- 
 cenzo Bolgeni, bibliotecario del colegio romano, sul giuramento 
 civico, prescritto dalla republica romana agli istruttori e fun- 
 zionari pubblici." It is stated, with a proper reference, in 
 these words, " Pie VI consult^ par un cardinal archevque 
 sur la prestation du serment de fide'lite' a la republique Cisal- 
 pine, asseinbla une congregation de trois cardinaux et un 
 prelat secretaire, et d'apres leur avis, re"pondit qu'il n'etait pas 
 permis de le preter. L'auteur qui veut a toute force de- 
 meurer Catholique Romain et citoyen Romain, soutient que 
 ce n'est point la un jugement ex cathedra (un jugement dog- 
 matique). Le Pape avoit e^e* interroge officiellement par 
 trente e*vques frangois, sur la canonicite du serment substitue 
 par leur gouvernement a celui de la constitution civile du 
 clerge", laquelle, dit Bolgeni, avait e*te* abrog^e. Le Pape 
 consulta la meme congregation, et ensuite il repondit que 
 chacun devait agir d'apres les lumieres de sa conscience ; 
 mais que, dans le doute si la chose e"tait mauvaise, il fallait 
 ne point jurer. Les e>6ques insisterent et prtendirent que 
 le Pape etait oblige par le devoir de sa place, de declarer 
 categoriquement si le serment etait licite ou non. II con- 
 
AN INDEFINITE BEING. 61 
 
 I trust, Sir, that I have now put it out of your 
 power to shift the ground of debate in regard to 
 the doctrine of Exclusive Salvation, as it is held 
 in your Church. I hope I have made you to un- 
 derstand, that our fears of the practical conse- 
 quences of that doctrine directing the votes of 
 Roman Catholics in parliament, do not arise 
 from the uncharitableness of your belief in respect 
 to the final doom of individual heretics ; but from 
 the settled persuasion, which every one of you is 
 bound to live in, that heresy, in itself, is the highest 
 offence against Heaven. Your Irish bishops leave 
 such as are seduced into, or have imbibed that 
 greatest of crimes from their parents, " to the 
 righteous judgment of a merciful God." Every 
 pious Christian leaves the most notorious of- 
 fenders, who, unfortunately too often, are " se- 
 
 sulta de nouveau, et la re*ponse fut qu'on demeurait in de- 
 cretin (qu'on s'en tenait au decret pre'ce'dent) : Pobligation de 
 decider, impose'e au premier siege, e"tant re"elle a la ve*rite", mais 
 illimite'e quant au temps ; c'est a dire que le Pape term en 
 conscience de repondre, pouvait, s'il le jugeoit a propos, ne 
 repondre jamais." Vie de Scipion de Ricci par de Potter, 
 tome II, p. 426. 
 
62 DEFENCE OF THE 
 
 duced" into vice, " and imbibe it from their 
 parents," to the same merciful judgment; but does 
 that charitable hope imply, that pious Christians 
 conceive themselves free from all obligation to 
 discountenance the existence and increase of such 
 offenders, or that they could conscientiously en- 
 gage to support an establishment to promote se- 
 duction; and to perpetuate an inheritance of 
 iniquity and vice, from parents to children for 
 ever ? Who could listen to such a perversion of 
 every moral principle ? Yet, after trying to make 
 us believe that your Church allows you a similar 
 perversion of her most evident rules of faith and 
 action, you have the courage to retort upon us, 
 and endeavour to stain the Protestant Church 
 with the black spot of persecution, which is in- 
 delibly stamped on your forehead ! 
 
 VII. 
 
 " Such, then (say you), being the tenets of the 
 Roman Catholic Church on this important point, 
 may want of charity upon it be objected to her ? 
 
PROTESTANT CHURCHES. 63 
 
 It cannot be objected to her by a Protestant of 
 the Established Church of England, as the Atha- 
 nasian creed and its damnatory clause, form a part 
 of her liturgy ; or by a Protestant of the Esta- 
 blished Church of Scotland., as the Protestants of 
 that Church, in their Profession of Faith of 1568, 
 say, that out of the Church there is neither life 
 nor everlasting happiness; or by a Protestant 
 of the French Huguenot Church, as in their 
 Catechism they profess, in their explanation of the 
 tenth article of the creed, that out of the Church 
 there is nothing but death and damnation*." 
 
 As much, Sir, as you " love a strong argument," 
 so much do I detest an evasion, especially when 
 not free from a spice of malice. An involved 
 sophism gives exercise to my mind ; an irrele- 
 vant answer, with an air of defiance, affords it 
 only to my patience. 
 
 Ever since the Gospel was published, there has 
 not been a Christian, who has not limited the 
 peculiar salvation which that Gospel proclaims, 
 to those, who by faith in its doctrines, belong to 
 
 * Vindication, p. xxxv and xxxvi. 
 
64 DEFENCE OF THE 
 
 the Church of Christ. If this be intolerance, we 
 all plead guilty to the charge. But there is only 
 one Church, which has made belief, upon her au- 
 thority, an essential part of the Christian Faith ,< 
 without which, no man can be saved. The 
 Church of England declares in the Athanasian 
 creed, that such as do not believe rightly, either 
 of the Trinity, or of the Incarnation, have not true 
 Christian Faith ; and are, consequently, excluded 
 from the privileges of the Gospel. But yours 
 professes, that if a man should cordially embrace 
 every article of her creed, and yet reject that, 
 which makes it necessary to believe them on her 
 authority , and within the spiritual pale of the 
 Pope; that man is excluded from the Gospel 
 salvation. Do you perceive no difference be- 
 tween your uncharitableness and what you will 
 have it to be our uncharitableness? Our un- 
 charitableness, as you name it, cannot, after all, 
 break out into persecution; yours must. Pro- 
 testants do not pretend to possess a living and 
 infallible oracle : and though the sincere among 
 them most firmly believe in the doctrines pro- 
 pounded by their Churches from the Scriptures, 
 
PROTESTANT CHURCHES. 65 
 
 they admit the possibility, that they may be 
 wrong in some points. How then could we 
 conscientiously molest any man, for the sake of 
 urging him into our particular Church, when in 
 injuring him we should do that which cannot 
 possibly be right, with an object which we do not 
 believe to be indispensably necessary for his final 
 happiness? Strongly persuaded as we are, that 
 no system of Christianity has blended with the 
 true doctrines of the Gospel so many or so dan- 
 gerous errors as Popery ; yet we can never fall 
 into the lamentable mistake, that it is absolutely 
 necessary for the supreme spiritual good of man- 
 kind, to harass or seduce you out of your Church. 
 Compare the conduct of the Church of England 
 with the acknowledged proceedings of your 
 own, at this moment. Does our Church set 
 her snares on the territories where yours prevails? 
 Does the Church of England call Italy, or France, 
 or Spain, her mission ? Does she keep a numerous 
 establishment of bishops and priests in any of 
 those countries, as the congregation de Propa- 
 ganda keeps among us ? What, then, can be the 
 cause of this remarkable difference of conduct ? 
 
66 DEFENCE OF THE 
 
 Surely it is not heedlessness, on our part, as to the 
 spiritual interests of our fellow-creatures ; for 
 Protestant England is as' active in spreading 
 Christianity among the heathen, as you are in 
 spreading Popery among us. The different con- 
 duct of the two Churches, in regard to each 
 other, arises from the deep-seated intolerance of 
 yours, and the settled toleration of ours. Yours 
 considers Protestant England in the light that 
 we consider the countries where we send mis- 
 sions. We are heathen to her ; you are deluded 
 Christians to us. We certainly believe, that 
 Roman Catholics have in their Church more 
 obstacles to salvation through Christ, than any 
 other denomination of Christians : but as we 
 know that, nevertheless, you belong to Him, and 
 we have no infallible living authority, which, em- 
 bodying the passions and interests of a set of 
 men in its oracles, may call upon us, as we hope 
 for salvation, to destroy, or injure, or any way 
 disturb you; the duty of Christian charity can 
 never be made an instrument of persecution 
 among us. 
 
 You assert that your duty with regard to us is 
 
PROTESTANT CHURCHES. 67 
 
 limited to preaching and teaching. You say it ; 
 your Church has never said so. But do not, Sir, 
 lose sight, as I always find you disposed to do, 
 of the subject in reference to which we are 
 examining, what I call the active intolerance of 
 your Church; that acknowledged duty of preach- 
 ing and teaching among us, which I leave you to 
 name as you please. We are considering the 
 persecuting spirit of your Church, not in the 
 abstract, but in relation to the object for which 
 you invariably contend in your works the apti- 
 titude of Roman Catholics to sit as legislators in 
 a Protestant Parliament. You grant in your 
 answer to my question, that the Pope may " com- 
 mand the assistance of the faithful in checking 
 the progress of heresy, by preaching and teach- 
 ing ; " that Roman Catholics acknowledge, that 
 he can issue such commands, in virtue of the 
 divine authority which they believe to reside in 
 him. Why, then, are they bound to obey those 
 commands to check heresy, but because heresy 
 is considered by themselves and their Church an 
 evil ; an evil which should be opposed by every 
 method allowed by the Gospel? You observe, 
 
 F 2 
 
68 DEFENCE OF THE 
 
 that I am taking all your suppositions for granted. 
 Now, Sir, I pray tell me, will the admission of 
 Roman Catholics to the places from which they 
 are excluded, operate favourably or unfavourably 
 to Protestantism? If favourably, why do not 
 you fulfil your duty of opposing the progress of 
 heresy, by continuing your absence from both 
 Houses ? Surely you will not pretend to say, 
 that the Gospel forbids that method of counter- 
 acting a deadly error. I will leave the other 
 member of my dilemma to you. You will cer- 
 tainly not take it in the affirmative ; but if you 
 do not grant, that the presence of Roman Ca- 
 tholics in Parliament will be adverse to the 
 Protestant religion, there is but one means of 
 escape left you. Will you say, that the presence 
 of Roman Catholics in Parliament will tend 
 neither way ; that their votes will not have the 
 weight of a feather on either of the scales where 
 the fate of the two contending Churches is 
 weighed ? Do, Sir, say so to the Protestants of 
 Great Britain and Ireland : show them the ad- 
 vantage of possessing such impassive legislators : 
 enlarge on* the fresh spirit that will be infused 
 
PROTESTANT CHURCHES. 69 
 
 into their Parliament, by a crowd of members 
 endowed with a glorious indifference for one 
 essential part of the constitution of England her 
 Protestant Church. 
 
 I hope I am approaching the end of a task, 
 which I am executing with no small fatigue. 
 But as I intend to leave none of your answers 
 untouched, I must take those that still remain, 
 without much attention to the flow and smooth- 
 ness of transition. I entreat this indulgence with 
 the greater confidence, as the topics of your notes 
 on my book are desultory. Indeed, I well know, 
 that your only chance lies in the perpetual shift- 
 ing of the question. 
 
 VIII. 
 
 Whether instinctively, as nature operates in 
 all cases of self-defence, or by a particular habit 
 of mind acquired in your long practice of de- 
 fending a bad cause ; I have found you constantly 
 flying off from the true question to the most 
 irrelevant arguments. It is thus that you touch 
 
70 FRESH EVASIONS 
 
 again on the deposing power of the Pope; his 
 claims to temporal sovereignty over other king- 
 doms the Inquisition, and your personal detes- 
 tation of that tribunal. I have never contended, 
 that the generality of your Roman Catholics, at 
 this time of day, defend any of these points. If 
 they did, the practical question in this country 
 would be, not whether they should be admitted 
 to seats in Parliament, but by what restrictions 
 they should be kept from injuring and conspiring 
 against the state. To what purpose then (unless 
 it be to divert the mind of the public from the 
 true question) is what you say about, " all Aus- 
 trian, German, Hungarian, Bohemian, and French 
 Roman Catholics, unimproved under Protestant 
 government," clinging in a modified manner to 
 the Pope, and not one of those states having 
 allowed the establishment of the fnquisition 
 within it? Does that prove that Roman Ca- 
 tholics are conscientiously friendly to Protestant 
 establishments, arid therefore safe legislators 
 where the constitution is essentially Protestant? 
 But, Sir, you might content yourself with dexter- 
 ously avoiding what, if constantly kept in view. 
 
OF THE TRUE QUESTION. 71 
 
 must defeat your purpose, without proceeding to 
 attribute to me what, if you had read my book 
 with attention and candour, you would know not 
 to be the fact. " Can we, therefore (such are 
 your words), be said with justice to cling to the 
 Pope, in the manner in which this expression is 
 constantly used by Mr. Blanco White?" Now, 
 Sir, I call upon you to make good this charge. 
 Where have I said that you cling to the Pope as 
 a temporal sovereign, or as an authority which 
 can depose Princes, or even, speaking of you 
 in general, as supporters of the Inquisition *. 
 Have I not said, but a few pages before that 
 which you were examining, " I have hitherto ex- 
 
 * That some English Roman Catholics clung to the Pope a 
 few years since, in the way last mentioned, I asserted in my 
 " Poor Man's Preservative against Popery," on the authority 
 of a most respectable Roman Catholic Priest, whose words I 
 will here repeat. " During my residence in London, I heard 
 some Roman Catholics say, that the Inquisition was useful in 
 Spain for the preservation of the Catholic Faith ; and that it 
 would have been well for France if it had had a similar esta- 
 blishment." Llorente's History of the Spanish Inquisition, 
 Paris, 1818, vol. i,pagexxvii. 
 
72 THE SOURCE OF INTOLERANCE 
 
 amined the Roman Catholic doctrine of the 
 Pope's supremacy, not because I conceive it to 
 have any practical effect in this country, &c.?" 
 Believe me, Sir, my Evidence makes but a small 
 volume, not for want of materials against Ca- 
 tholicism, considered both in regard to Politics 
 and Christianity; but because I wished to con- 
 tract the field of our warfare, and allow no room 
 to your skirmishing. 
 
 1.1 have said, and I maintain, that you still 
 " cling to the source of intolerance which has 
 inundated Europe with blood;" but I never as- 
 serted that all of you cling to the Pope, in the 
 manner which you, without any reason, insinuate 
 to be my meaning*. 
 
 * The rapid manner, in which my ideas have succeeded 
 each other during the week which I have employed in the 
 composition of this letter, made me forget one, and only one 
 topic, mentioned in Mr. Butler's notice of my work, till I had 
 finished my manuscript. I mean the definition of the Pope's 
 authority, given by the Council of Florence. The inaccuracy 
 of Mr. Butler's translation of that decree I have made mani- 
 fest at the end of the Preface to the second edition of my 
 Evidence against Catholicism. But I must be allowed to dwell 
 with satisfaction on the shifts to which Mr. Butler and his 
 
SUPPORTED BY THE ROMAX CATHOLICS. 73 
 
 That, in spite of all your protests against the 
 Inquisition, you still cling to the authority which 
 
 friends are driven, when compared with the careless confi- 
 dence which they themselves have made evident on my part. 
 I once trusted a garbled copy of their Profession of Faith, be- 
 cause I could not at first entertain a suspicion that it had been 
 curtailed to serve the Roman Catholic interest in this country. 
 After that, when a writer in the Edinburgh Review had the 
 impudence to charge me with the omission of a sentence in 
 the definition of the Council of Florence, I took it for granted 
 that such was the fact ; and not having a copy of my book at 
 hand, I contented myself with showing, that the clause in 
 question had been artfully distorted in the English transla- 
 tion ; that it did not at all help my adversary ; and that (so 
 far was I from thinking otherwise) I had already inserted the 
 whole decree in my second edition, both in Greek and Latin. 
 But, lo and behold! Mr. Butler (without alluding to the 
 false charge made against me, that, indeed, would have 
 been a miracle of candour) declares, that " I had ac- 
 curately transcribed his version of the Canon of the 10th 
 Session of the Council of Florence," and upon turning 
 to my book, I found that it is really so. Such is the 
 difference between a man who feels habitually the wealth 
 of truth, and those who seldom touch her gold : he casts up 
 his account in round sums, and never runs after poorer 
 folks if they happen to take liberties with his shillings 
 and pence. After all, the quibbling upon the Canon of the 
 Council of Florence is pitiful. Let the reader observe how 
 
74 THE SOURCE OF INTOLERANCE 
 
 sanctioned that tribunal, is a fact, to disprove 
 which, you must convince the world that the 
 Papal See never approved its establishment, or 
 supported the enforcement of its laws of blood. 
 That you cling to the source of the intolerance 
 
 many things the Canon must endure before it can answer Mr 
 Butler's purpose. " Et ipsi (Romano Pontifici) in beato 
 Petro pascendi, regendi ac gubernandi universalem ecclesiam 
 a Domino nostro Jesu Christo plenum potestatem traditam 
 esse ; quemadmodum etiam in gestis CEcumenicorum concilio- 
 rum, et in sacris canonibus continetur." Any man, not 
 blinded by the strong glare of a seat in Parliament, would 
 understand that the decree refers itself to Councils and 
 Canons, in confirmation of its contents. "We declare this, 
 as the Councils and Canons have declared it before." But 
 that will not do: Mr. Butler must take no notice of the 
 etiam; and his translation runs as is declared; not, as it is 
 also declared in Councils and Canons. In the next place, 
 his version must be allowed to constitute a limitation to the 
 power of the Pope : and so the sense of the inspired Council 
 will be, " we declare that the Pope has FULL power, LIMITED 
 by the Councils ! !" Lastly, Protestants must rest satisfied that 
 the Councils and Canons have completely tied down the hands 
 of the Pope, in regard to them, and that, upon this security, 
 they may trust his spiritual subjects, those whom he is to 
 " feed, rule, and govern" with the highest, and the only 
 irresponsible power of the state, short of the throne! 
 
SUPPORTED BY THE ROMAN CATHOLICS. 75 
 
 which affords to infidels the most dangerous ar- 
 gument against Christianity, I will incessantly 
 assert ; for it is the Church, as Roman, which for 
 nearly fifteen centuries has allowed no peace or 
 safety to those who have dissented from it. 
 Whether the persecution was carried on by means 
 of exile, fine, and degradation, as it was the case 
 at first; or whether by fire and sword, as in after 
 times : the Christian world rung with praises be- 
 stowed on such measures by your Popes, Coun- 
 cils, and Fathers. Yes, Sir: I speak confidently 
 and advisedly. I am acquainted with the pas- 
 sages from the Fathers, mentioned by Fleury and 
 the other Jansenist writers, who would reduce 
 persecution to what that celebrated author calls 
 " peines medidnales pour la conversion des here- 
 tiquesf but those passages prove no more than 
 that some good men, anterior to the eighth cen- 
 tury, abhorred the shedding of blood. Chrysostom 
 is, I believe, the only one, who, from the time 
 when Popes and Patriarchs had the secular 
 powers for their allies, rejects the principle 
 itself of persecution. The rejection of that horri- 
 ble principle was general in the Church of Christ, 
 
76 BELLARMINE'S REASON 
 
 only during the short period of that original 
 purity of doctrine, which the Protestant Reformers 
 aimed at, and restored. But persecution that 
 infernal seed of nominal Christianity and real in- 
 fidelity was fostered by the Church in propor- 
 tion as the number of Romanists swelled: and 
 from the fifth century from the time when Saint 
 Augustine recommended tine and other such 
 penalties against the Donatists to the age of the 
 Council of Trent and Bellarmine, that modern 
 Father of your Church, who advised his brother 
 Romanists to kill the heretics for the good of the 
 heretics themselves; the poisonous plant spread 
 its deadly shade most rapidly over the world. 
 I will not let pass this opportunity of recording, 
 in the free and noble language of England, the 
 humane principle urged by your Cardinal. 
 
 2. " Finally (says Bellarmine), it is good for 
 obstinate heretics that they be put to death ; for 
 the longer they live, the more errors they invent, 
 the more people they seduce, and the greater 
 damnation they lay up in store for themselves." 
 
 Perhaps you will exert your ingenuity to make 
 the public regard such maxims as obsolete, and 
 
FOR DESTROYING HERETICS. 77 
 
 long buried in the ponderous folios where they 
 originally appeared. That supposition, Sir, I am 
 ready most flatly to contradict. The same maxim 
 was prevalent and popular in Spain, and I myself 
 imbibed it with the earliest religious instruction, 
 which that most Roman Catholic Country in- 
 stilled into my mind. I well recollect, that 
 Bellarmine's maxim (not however as his, but as a 
 doctrine incorporated with the common-sense of 
 the country) was explained to me, on the occa- 
 sion of the last execution of a heretic in my na- 
 tive town of Seville, when I was between seven 
 and eight years old. The same doctrine was, 
 long after, broached in my presence, by the cele- 
 brated Father Vega, of the Oratory of St. Philip 
 Neri, who had attended the unhappy victim a 
 blind old woman to the stake. He spoke with 
 great feeling (for your priests, Sir, were often 
 bathed in tears on those occasions) of the fate of 
 the poor woman, who was converted too late to 
 save her life, and made her last confession to him 
 on the scaffold. But he rejoiced that the hand of 
 the executioner had put an end to her spiritual 
 danger from heresy, to which he assured the 
 
78 POLICY RECOMMENDED 
 
 company (a numerous set of young men pre- 
 paring for orders) that her mind had been na- 
 turally and almost irresistibly inclined. If you 
 feel disposed to know more of Father Vega, give 
 me leave to direct you to my Letters from Spain. 
 I must, however, revert to Bellarmine, and give 
 you, in his own words, the course of policy, 
 which your Church has been following for some 
 time, in regard to this and other Protestant 
 kingdoms. 
 
 3. " When we enter upon the particular 
 question (says the great pillar of Popery) about 
 heretics, or thieves, or other wicked persons, 
 whether they should be extirpated; we must 
 always consider, according to the reason given 
 by our Lord, whether that can be done without 
 detriment to the good ; and if so, they should be 
 extirpated without all doubt. But if not, either 
 because they cannot well be known, and there is 
 a danger of making the innocent suffer instead of 
 the guilty ; or when they are stronger than our- 
 selves, and there is a danger, lest, if we attack 
 them, there should be a greater loss on our than 
 on their side ; then we must be quiet." 
 
BY BELLARMINE. 79 
 
 Sir; Bellarmine, the man wjjo taught these 
 doctrines, received a cardinal's hat, as a reward 
 and encouragement to his labours, from that 
 Church, which you recognize as the Mother and 
 Mistress of all Churches, and in the communion 
 with which you make your own salvation depend. 
 Think of this, when you next feel inclined to 
 complain of me for saying, that you cling to the 
 source of persecution* . 
 
 * I will copy the original authorities on Persecution, which 
 I have translated or alluded to, in the above portion of the 
 text. For the sake of such of my readers as may not under- 
 stand Greek and Latin, I will add translations of the rest. 
 
 The passage of Saint Chrysostom is : Ou $si avoupeiv 
 srfsi Q rtotepos affrfovSo; si$ fyv oixwpsvyv epsXXsv 
 i. " Heretics should not be destroyed; for this 
 would introduce an endless war into the world/' Komil. xlvii, 
 in Matt. ap. Mosheim de Pcenis Heret. p. 501. It does not 
 appear, however, that Chrysostom applied his principle to 
 methods of persecution short of death. 
 
 The passage in Fleury. Ainsi voyons-nous que le concile 
 de Latran sous Alexandre IIT, reconnoit que 1'eglise rejette 
 les executions sanglantes, quoiqu'elle souffre d'etre aide*e par 
 les loix des princes chretiens pour re*primer les heretiques : 
 la maxime a toujours e*te* constante. Mais dans la pratique 
 
80 UNFAIR TREATMENT 
 
 IX. 
 
 But the moment, Sir, is arrived, when I must 
 begin a remonstrance, which I cannot hope to 
 
 on ne Pa pas toujours suivie. (Fleury then proceeds to ac- 
 knowledge the massacres commanded by the See of Rome, 
 and continues thus) Si Ton n'e*pargnoit pas la vie des 
 he*re*tiques il ne faut pas s'e'tonner qu'on leur 6tat leurs biens. 
 Aussi avez-vous vu que Gregoire VII offrit a Suenon roi de 
 Danemark, une province trea-riche occupe*e par de he're'ti- 
 ques, pour etre le partage d'un de ses fils ; comme si Fhdrlsie 
 etoit un titre le*gitime de conqu^te. Depuis, les canonistes 
 ont e*tabli en maxime, que les he*re*tiques n'ont droit de rien 
 posse*der, se fondant sur quelques passages de S. Augustin 
 rapporte*s par Gratien. Mais ils ont etendu a tous les he*re"- 
 tiques et a tous leur biens ce que S. Augustin ne dit que des 
 Donatistes, des amendes pe*cuniaires de'cerne'es centre eux, et 
 des biens d'e"glise qu'on les avoit obliges a rendre. Laissez 
 les reflexions de Gratien, les sommaires et les gloses mo- 
 dernes, et lisez les textes originaux ; vous verrez qu'ils ne 
 respirent que douceur et charite", et quil ne s'agit que des 
 restitutions justes, et des peines medicinales pour la Conversion 
 des heretiques. Fleury, Disc, sur 1'Hist. Ecclesiast. Disc. IV. 
 Passages from Bellarmine. Denique hsereticis obstinatis 
 beneficium est quod de vit& tollantur : nam quo diutius vivunt, 
 
OF THE AUTHOR. 81 
 
 conclude in a tone suited to that unruffled style, 
 which, being often used in your writings as a 
 veil to very bitter feelings, has hitherto given 
 you an unfair advantage in this controversy. 
 Clouds of doubt as to your candour and good- 
 nature have, however, been fast settling of late 
 over your name ; and the most polite of your ad- 
 versaries have been forced to conclude in strong 
 terms the addresses which they began in the tone 
 of respect and politeness. I, for one, am forced 
 to declare, that though my notions of your can- 
 dour towards me were not sanguine, I could not, 
 some time ago, have believed that I should be 
 
 eo plures errores excogitant, plures pervertunt, et majorem 
 sibi damnationem acquirunt. De Laicis, Lib. Ill, c. xxii, 
 p. 550, ap. Mosheim, de Pcenis heret. p. 490. 
 
 " Cum autem in particular! qusestio est vel de haereticis, 
 vel de furibus, vel de aliis malis, an sint extirpandi, semper 
 conside rand urn est, juxta rationem Domini, an id possit fieri 
 sine detrimento bonorum, et si quidem potest, sunt procul 
 dubio extirpandi : si autem non possunt, quia vel non sunt 
 satis noti, vel periculum est, ne plectantur innocentes pro 
 nocentibus, vel sunt fortiores nobis, et periculum est, ne, si 
 eos bello aggrediamur, plures ex nobis cadant quam ex illis, 
 tune quiescendam est." Id.ib. p. 510. 
 
 G 
 
82 UNFAIR TREATMENT 
 
 obliged to address you in the plain language 
 which you see me already adopting. I trust, 
 that, though labouring under a keen sense of 
 wrong and insult, I should be able to moderate 
 the tone of my remonstrance, if I thought that 
 such an act of self-denial was demanded by the 
 duty of Christian moderation : but I am con- 
 vinced that, in the present case, I should injure 
 the interests of my cause by subduing the bursts 
 of indignation and pain, which alternately rise 
 in my heart. I must show the number and 
 nature of the wounds which I receive from my 
 enemies, that my friends may learn the spirit 
 which animates their councils, and directs their 
 weapons. When it shall have appeared how 
 much share you have in the wrongs of which I 
 complain, the public will, I am sure, acquit me 
 of want of moderation towards you. 
 
 I have lately referred to my knowledge of the 
 state of Spain : and, in my Evidence, I made a 
 considerable use of that knowledge to show the 
 manner in which the principles and doctrines of 
 your Church operate, when uncontrolled by neigh- 
 bouring Protestantism. The information which 
 
OF THE AUTHOR. 83 
 
 I brought forward, originates chiefly in some cir- 
 cumstances of my life ; circumstances of which I 
 gave a detail. One of the facts I related is 
 closely connected with the deepest impressions of 
 my heart. It relates. Sir, to my mother. The 
 subject is too painful for me to repeat what I 
 have stated in my book ; and my narrative seems 
 to have had some effect upon you. You say, 
 speaking of me in relation to the trying circum- 
 stances in which my mother and myself were 
 placed by the tyranny of a Church which threat- 
 ened my life for dissent, and made that excellent 
 woman's love of my soul, a means of leading me 
 to imprisonment, dishonour, and, in case of final 
 resistance, to death that you " sincerely sym- 
 pathise with me, and do not feel less indignation 
 against the monstrous code of penal inflictions 
 which occasioned this suffering" than myself. 
 Sir, I really felt obliged to you, for that gleam of 
 candour and kindness. But your habitual and 
 evidently angry prejudices, soon making you 
 resort to an evasion as little creditable to your 
 logical powers as to the fairness of your mind, it 
 was not long before I perceived that I could not 
 
 G 2 
 
84 UNFAIR TREATMENT 
 
 depend at all on your sympathy. You betrayed 
 yourself in your next words. " But the penal 
 codes of Elizabeth reduced many a mother, who 
 would not inform, in certain, cases, against her 
 child, to similar woe*." Pity it is, indeed, that 
 you could grow so angry at the sympathy I had 
 obtained from you, as to assume so instantaneously 
 the offensive, and return so random a blow. 
 What, Sir, have the two cases in common, but 
 the words mother, child, and informing? DO 
 you imagine, that the mother, whose character 
 I described, would have been distressed by her 
 own danger, under a mere civil law which 
 threatened her life in case she did not inform 
 against her child? Are you a father, and can 
 you so grossly misunderstand the case I laid 
 before you ? Sir, the incomparable woman, 
 through whom I have my being, would have met 
 a thousand deaths to save the life of any of her 
 children. It was not the fear of consequences 
 against herself, if she disobeyed the law, that 
 produced her misery and my own danger: had 
 
 * Vindication, p. xxxii. 
 
OF THE AUTHOR. 85 
 
 your Church nothing but the love of life, by 
 which to induce her to inform against her son, 
 she would have scorned the pitiful bribe. Say 
 what you please of the penal laws of Elizabeth : 
 neither myself, nor the Church in which I have 
 found rest to my soul, have any concern with 
 them. Inveigh, as long as you find words, 
 against a law that could use a mother's fears of 
 death as a means to bring her child to punish- 
 ment ; but reserve all the fire of your invective 
 for that truly satanic law of your Church, which 
 could array a mother's purest love, not of self, 
 but of her child's soul, against his liberty, his 
 honour, and his life. Your Church had taught 
 my mother, in the name and by the pretended 
 authority of the Saviour she adored, that, should 
 she hear from me a heretical sentiment, it was 
 her duty, in order to save my soul, to betray my 
 person to the Inquisitors : your Church had 
 taught her, that, in such a case, the only way to 
 save me from eternal flames, was to terrify me 
 into the Romish creed, by putting me into hands 
 that could quench my life in those of the Holy 
 Tribunal. Does not this prove what I said in 
 
m UNFAIR TREATMENT 
 
 close connection with, my melancholy narrative, 
 that the Church of Rome, by her inherent and 
 inseparable intolerance, that intolerance which 
 directly flows from her exclusiveness, " makes 
 your very benevolence a curse*?" Sir, I will 
 not appeal again to you, to conceive the horror 
 of the situation in which my mother and myself 
 were placed by that principle, which as long as 
 you remain a true Roman Catholic, you must 
 profess : your prejudices disturb the natural good 
 feelings of your heart : it appears benumbed by a 
 charm when your Church, and her political in- 
 terests in this kingdom, stand between it and 
 those delicate sympathies which you began to 
 experience on hearing my case. I will refer that 
 case to any one but a true son of your Church. 
 From such, circumstanced as I am, I do not 
 expect the common feelings of humanity. 
 
 The moment I had written the conclusion of 
 the last paragraph, I was going to run my pen 
 across it : and doubtless it would not have kept 
 its place in this letter, had I not at that very 
 
 * Practical and Internal Evidence, p. 61, 1st edit. 
 
OF THE AUTHOR. 87 
 
 moment cast my eyes on the lines which you 
 wrote after that revulsion of feeling, which made 
 you angry at the approach of something like 
 kindness and candour, while engaged in this 
 controversy. " It sickens me, you say, to re- 
 turn to this sad subject." What! do you ex- 
 perience a sickening from the mere recollection 
 of Elizabeth's penal laws? What deadly faint- 
 ness of heart must / feel, when I remember your 
 Church and her tyranny? You recoil at the 
 memory of sufferings long soothed by death : 
 what bitterness of soul must seize me, who daily 
 and hourly endure the painful consequences of 
 having been born the spiritual slave of Rome ! 
 Think, then, how I must have felt, how I must 
 feel at this moment, when reading the concluding 
 words of the paragraph by which you have 
 brought all the sufferings of my life to my mind, 
 over-excited as it is, by following a representa- 
 tive and advocate of the Romish Church through 
 a maze of evasions, and provoked by his under- 
 hand blows. " Why (such are the words which, 
 since I began this letter, have been goading me 
 into indignation), why should Mr. Blanco White 
 
88 UNFAIR TREATMENT 
 
 write a book, the evident tendency of which is to 
 raise popular prejudice against us ; to perpetuate 
 the laws under which we suffer ; and thus to eter- 
 nize the depression of a large proportion of his 
 brother men, of his brother Christians, of those 
 with whom, not many years since, he walked in 
 union in the house of God ?" 
 
 Sir, I cannot answer such a cold-blooded insult 
 without collecting myself, lest I should do it in 
 terms unbecoming my character and my profes- 
 sion. The peculiar system of religion, of which 
 you have endeavoured to conceal the deformities, 
 as well as to defend or gloss over the crimes, de- 
 prived me of youthful happiness when I obeyed 
 its dictates, and gave me up to the dreariness of 
 disbelief, rather than permit me to be a Christian 
 under any other guidance*. You, even you, have 
 
 * Many have noticed this system of the Church of Rome. Thus 
 Burnett, History of His Own Times, anno 1661, vol. i, p. 324. 
 " And now that the main principle of religion was struck at 
 by Hobbes and his followers, the Papists acted upon this a very 
 strange part. They went in so far, even into the argument for 
 atheism, as to publish many books, in which they affirmed, 
 that there was no certain proof of the Christian religion, unless 
 
OF THE AUTHOR. 89 
 
 felt sympathy for my mother, whose life was made 
 by that religion an uninterrupted course of heart- 
 gnawing scruples and anxieties. Your religion 
 deprived me of two sisters, whom it beguiled into 
 convents, where they perished before the age of 
 maturity, in consequence of zeal misguided by 
 their Church. Your religion betrayed me into a 
 state, which turned into vice the natural affections 
 of a heart not formed for sensuality. The mental 
 tyranny of your Church maddened my thinking 
 powers, by forcing me to suppress their workings, 
 till I believed they could not be better employed 
 than in proving that religion was, to all mankind, 
 what, under the control of Rome, I saw it to be 
 to thousands of thousands of my countrymen a 
 plague and a curse ! You knew all this, for I have 
 stated it in my book with characters of truth which 
 no thoroughly good heart can mistake. And yet 
 
 we took it from the authority of the Church as infallible. This 
 was such a delivering up of the cause to them, that it raised 
 in all good men a very high indignation at Popery ; that party 
 showing, that they chose to make men, who would not turn 
 Papists, become atheists, rather than believe Christianity 
 upon any other ground than infallibility." 
 
90 UNFAIR TREATMENT 
 
 you cannot tell why I should oppose your varnished 
 representations of that religion ? and you can 
 assume the tone of remonstrance, and even quote 
 Scripture, to make me odious as a man who disre- 
 gards former ties, and cares not for the " improve- 
 ment of his brother men," and " will eternize their 
 depression!" Their depression! Turn, if you 
 can, an impartial eye to your own Church, and 
 there you will find the source of that depression. 
 I could in no better manner help my brother men 
 whom that Church degrades, than by exposing her 
 errors ; at least, such is my perfect conviction ; 
 and if you allow any weight to persuasion against 
 policy, you should have refuted the reasons on 
 which I have shown that persuasion to be founded, 
 before you flung your invidious question. The 
 seeds of that happiness (I might retort), which you 
 have enjoyed through a long and prosperous life, 
 among a large majority of your countrymen, who 
 profess a religion which your Church endeavoured 
 to drown in blood, were sown by men who checked 
 the same ecclesiastical power which you, at pre- 
 sent, obey so far and no more than it pleases you ; 
 but which, had it not been for the Reformation, 
 
OF THE AUTHOR. 91 
 
 would oblige you to worship it, as it obliges mil- 
 lions of Spaniards and Italians, with a blessing 
 in your lips and a curse in your heart. Were it 
 not for the Protestant Constitution which protects 
 you, you would tremble like a slave before that 
 spiritual power which is now content to keep you 
 on your own terms, and allows you to profess so 
 much of its faith, and pay it just the portion of 
 obedience, which suits your views. Had you been 
 a Roman Catholic under the uncontrolled sway of 
 your church, her enticements, and the inexperience 
 of youth, would probably have combined to make 
 you sacrifice your liberty and your natural rights, 
 by becoming one of her clergy. The offspring of 
 your stolen loves might be the living sin of a 
 faithless wife the object of struggling love and 
 hatred to a suspecting husband. Your misery, 
 your helpless slavery, might have left you without 
 God in the world. This (remember, Sir, I repeat 
 the assertion with unabated confidence), this is the 
 case of thousands among your clergy : and the 
 probability of its having been yours would have 
 increased in proportion to the fervour of your early 
 piety. In England, your treacherous Church has 
 
92 UNFAIR TREATMENT 
 
 few allurements for a young mind; and that is 
 probably the reason that you could avoid the 
 snares in which I was taken. You have met with 
 kindness and encouragement among the most 
 zealous members of the Established Church ; and 
 I have seen the identical place where from feel- 
 ings of gratitude, no doubt, but which your Church, 
 had the act been performed within her own domi- 
 nions, would have severely punished you de- 
 voutly asked and obtained the blessing of a noble 
 and most benevolent prelate for whom our Church 
 has lately mourned. This happiness, and this 
 freedom, within the pale of the proudest eccle- 
 siastical tyranny, you owe to the prevalence in 
 this kingdom of that form of Christianity which 
 you have attacked more insidiously than is fit for a 
 mind free from Roman Catholic bigotry, and less 
 openly and directly than it might be expected 
 from a sincere child of Rome. But who has ever 
 asked, why " should Mr. Butler write book after- 
 book, the evident tendency of which is to make 
 our people indifferent to the religion of the coun- 
 try, if not to raise prejudice against it; to per- 
 petuate a degrading superstition among a large 
 
OF THE AUTHOR. 93 
 
 portion of his fellow-countrymen ; to eternize the 
 necessity of the laws which withhold from them 
 the higher trusts of the state ; by keeping them in 
 subjection to a spiritual power, which is the de- 
 clared enemy of all we love best? Why should 
 he act thus towards men from whom he has re- 
 ceived so much kindness, with whom he has so 
 long lived in the daily intercourse of the most in- 
 timate friendship ?" Would you not feel indignant 
 at such a question, and plead your conscientious 
 belief as an unanswerable, a sacred reason, which 
 no man had a right to canvass ? 
 
 Ah, Sir, you can demand that respect from 
 Protestants, and have it paid you most readily 
 and willingly. / knew too well the effects of 
 your Church upon the heart and mind, to have 
 for a moment expected a similar treatment at your 
 hands. Yet I hoped you had not imbibed so 
 much of the grosser spirit of intolerance, as hardly 
 to allow me the treatment to which my birth, my 
 education, my former rank in life, and my conduct 
 entitle me. You publish a flat contradiction to 
 my statement of a matter of fact, which the cir- 
 cumstances of my life enabled me to ascertain ; 
 
94 UNFAIR TREATMENT 
 
 and that upon the authority of persons, not only 
 whose names you '-conceal, but whom you, inci- 
 dentally and unwittingly, describe as perfectly 
 disqualified to be witnesses on the subject in ques- 
 tion. " In page 60 (you say), Mr. Blanco White 
 informs us, that he knew very few Spanish priests, 
 whose talents or acquirements were above con- 
 tempt, who had not secretly renounced religion. 
 I have (you continue) never been in Spain, and 
 have known few Spanish priests ; but I have con- 
 versed with many Spanish and Irish Catholics, 
 intimately acquainted with the opinions, the man- 
 ners, and the habits, of the inhabitants of Spain. 
 All assure me, that there is not the slightest ground 
 for this accusation." 
 
 I will not express my feelings as to the manner 
 in which, after the positive and circumstantial 
 assertion which I have made in my " Evidence," 
 and in " Doblado's Letters," you still speak of 
 there being not the slightest ground for what you 
 are pleased to call my accusation. But I must 
 not refrain from saying, that your method of con- 
 tradicting my evidence is perfectly ludicrous in a 
 lawyer. Suppose a person from the neighbour- 
 
OF THE AUTHOR. 95 
 
 hood of Dover, who for many years had been 
 dealing in contraband goods, said, that some of 
 the inhabitants of that town, most respectable in 
 every other point, had been concerned with him 
 in the free trade : what would you think of the 
 acuteness of him who should gravely answer, " I 
 have never been at Dover ; but I have known 
 many friends and relations of the Custom-house 
 officers, and those employed in the preventive 
 service, who never knew any such persons : they 
 all assure me, 'that there is not the slightest foun- 
 dation for the accusation /'" Do you imagine, that 
 the Canons, and Prebendaries, and Vicars, of the 
 Church of Spain, would be ready to tell your 
 English and Irish Roman Catholic witnesses a 
 secret, which might cost them liberty, life, and 
 honour? How could such an absurdity enter 
 your thoughts ? Really, Sir, your understanding 
 seems bewildered when you are hard pressed on 
 these subjects. I fear, if you happen to read this 
 in that hurried state, I shall find it difficult to fix 
 your attention on the circumstances which enabled 
 me to know what escaped the observation of your 
 authorities. Recollect, I pray you, that I grew up 
 
96 UNFAIR TREATMENT 
 
 with a multitude of Spaniards who entered the 
 Church ; that I was myself a clergyman, not of 
 the lower ranks, in the Church of Spain ; that 
 men of the first dignity in it, were my bosom 
 friends ; that I had the same misfortune in point 
 of faith, which I attribute to others of my profes- 
 sion ; and that the danger and oppression result- 
 ing from that state of mind being common, it was 
 more natural that the victims of your Church 
 should recognize and trust their secrets to each 
 other, than that they should go with their sad 
 and dangerous tale to your English and Irish 
 Roman Catholic friends. Remember all this, 
 Sir, and keep your witnesses to allay the smart 
 which my declaration may have raised in the 
 consciences of some good old nuns of your 
 acquaintance. 
 
 But I wish you would tell the world where it 
 was you met with the Spanish witnesses you op- 
 pose to me. I have, however, some information 
 upon that point, which I will not withhold from 
 the public. You must then know, Sir, that 
 though among the Spaniards whom their own 
 and their country's misfortunes have thrown on 
 
OF THE AUTHOR. 97 
 
 these shores, there are some, who from political 
 difference of opinion are far from liking me; there 
 are others, who I am sure would save my life at 
 the risk of their own. It is the effect of the good 
 qualities of the nation, not of any remarkable 
 services which they owe to me. One of these 
 zealous friends of mine came to me a few days 
 ago, to tell me that I must prepare myself to meet a 
 fierce attack on the part of the Roman Catholics : 
 for an emissary of a great man among them a 
 Mr. Butler, the nephew of the biographer of the 
 saints had been exceedingly active among the 
 Spanish emigrants, speaking most violently 
 against me, and begging to know whatever they 
 might be disposed to tell, to strengthen the hands of 
 his employer against me. So innocent was my ex- 
 cellent friend of every thing relating to you, Sir, 
 previously to his meeting with your collector 'of 
 materials for controversy, that he imagined your 
 name had been unknown to me till he mentioned 
 it. The result of your second-hand inquiries I do 
 not pretend to know; but I strongly suspect that 
 the report of my unfortunate countrymen would 
 
98 UNFAIR TREATMENT 
 
 do your Church little good. Believe me, Sir, - 
 they know her too well to love her. 
 
 My report of the state of a considerable part 
 of the Clergy, differs no doubt from those 
 which circulate throughout the nation; but it 
 is in the caution with which I limit it, and the 
 delicacy with which, from fear of betraying the 
 confidence of friendship, I have worded it. 
 Would you know how the popular opinion runs 
 among a large portion of the nation ? You may 
 have it in the words of a Spaniard, who has very 
 recently published a novel, descriptive of the 
 manners and state of the country. I do not quote 
 from the novel, but the Preface ; nor do I mean to 
 countenance the report I am going to copy, as to 
 its details. I warrant it only as to its expressing 
 the real opinion of a great part of Spain. 
 
 " With respect (says the writer) to the conduct 
 of that grave personage of his tale, the monk, 
 the author can assure his reader, that it is a faith- 
 ful copy, taken from certain good prelates, who 
 are now at the head of the Spanish Church. 
 Every body in Spain, who takes the trouble of 
 
OF THE AUTHOR. 99 
 
 looking at things with his own eyes, sees that the 
 generality of them are downright Atheists. < He 
 believes in a God,' said a certain bishop to a friend 
 of the author, alluding contemptuously to another 
 clergyman, who passed for a man of talent and 
 intrigue, what great things can any one expect 
 from him *:'" 
 
 Your emissary may, to your satisfaction, ascer- 
 tain the fact that the author of this passage is 
 really a Spaniard. 
 
 X. 
 
 But did that emissary, having failed in collect- 
 ing facts to your liking, bring some other kind of 
 stories for the British Catholic Association some 
 proper ammunition for the filth-engines which 
 the two bodies of that name, both in this country 
 and in Ireland, never fail to place in front of their 
 lines ? You, Sir, were present at the Speech, in 
 which Mr. Eneas M'Donnell opened that kind of 
 fire against me ; for your name as a speaker ap- 
 pears before that noble piece of Hiberno- Roman 
 
 * Preface to Sandoval, or the Freemason, page vii. 
 
 H 2 
 
100 ATTACKS OF THE 
 
 eloquence, and I find you afterwards calling to 
 order a poor honest man, who ventured to des- 
 cribe the whole of the proceedings of the meeting 
 "a farce*." You were present, Sir, and I can- 
 
 * " Mr. French said that it might be in the recollection of 
 the meeting, that Sir Francis Burdett had expressed some 
 years ago in Parliament his disgust and indignation at what 
 he called the periodical return of the solemn farce. Circum- 
 stances had since occurred which induced that honourable 
 baronet to alter his opinion : but as he (Mr. French) per- 
 fectly coincided with him then as to the solemnity of the 
 farce, so he would state his own opinion to be unaltered from 
 
 the very first exhibition of it, down to the present moment 
 
 Yet he trusted that nothing short of general emancipation 
 (query, what is the extent of an emancipation more general 
 than that asked for in the " periodical farce?") would ever be 
 hailed by the Roman Catholics, or received by the general 
 body of the unprotesting believers in the Church of Rome. 
 Never let such an impious such an unnatural triumph be 
 
 paid to Caesar ! To struggle for emancipation was an idle 
 
 waste of time, labour, and money (no ! no ! no !), &c. &c. 
 Mr. Butler rose to order, but Mr. French continued speaking. 
 Mr. Butler at length succeeded in observing, that there was 
 still much business before the meeting, and it was already 
 four o'clock : he therefore trusted that the learned gentleman 
 would speak to the question Mr. French, after apolo- 
 gizing, continued. When the present objections are buried 
 
CATHOLIC ASSOCIATION. 101 
 
 not tell whether you joined in the rapturous 
 cheers, with which the low reviling of my name 
 and character was greeted. But whether you 
 did or not, I must pause to consider you in 
 your character of a member, an active member 
 too, of the British Roman Catholsc^AtisceiatiotL 
 This, Sir, is the more necessary, aS when I Ven- 
 tured to enter the lists with you, I did not know the 
 kind of auxiliaries which were ready to support 
 you against me. Now that the late proceedings of 
 the Body to which you belong have opened my 
 eyes, I must be allowed to call the attention of 
 the public to our relative positions, and implore 
 their sense of justice against the unfairness with 
 which I am met in this contest. I am a private 
 individual, without any support but what I derive 
 from the recollection, that even in the land of my 
 
 in oblivion, others will arise, and the Catholics will never be 
 restored to their rights (Cries of " question !"). " Bring 
 the Catholics in close contact with Government," said Mr. 
 Plunkett, and so says the Devil (a loud uproar), and so say 
 even some of the Catholics themselves, for (here we lost 
 Mr. French's voice in the surrounding discord.) The Catho- 
 lic Miscellany for February and March, 1826, pages 101, 102. 
 
102 ATTACKS OF THE 
 
 voluntary exile I have some friends, who feel to- 
 wards me as if nature had united us by the rela- 
 tion of birth. I have entered the lists of contro- 
 versy under the disadvantage of using a language 
 which I never cultivated in earnest till the age 
 ,. of five-^and, thirty. The vulgar prejudice against 
 a; change of religion must always be alive against 
 me, except where an intimate knowledge of my 
 character and circumstances removes it. Time 
 has not yet allowed me to stop the mouth of 
 those who doubt the purity of my motives for 
 advocating the cause in which I am engaged. 
 Every thing but truth is against me ; and truth, 
 though an unfailing, is nevertheless a slow-paced 
 protector. You, Sir, are in your own country; 
 you are a practised writer in your own language; 
 your prosperity has made you friends : the fortu- 
 nate coincidence of your religious belief with that 
 of the party among which you had your birth 
 and education, gives to you the respectability of 
 consistency, a quality which the world esteems, 
 without much regard to whether it assists truth or 
 error. Such, indeed, are your decided advan- 
 tages, that had I not felt the unconquerable 
 
CATHOLIC ASSOCIATION. 103 
 
 strength of perfect conviction within me, I should 
 have shrunk from the contest. 
 
 Yet, not content with so much vantage ground, 
 I find that you come against me supported by 
 the Roman Catholic Association; and that the 
 abuse, the insult, the slander, from which you so 
 carefully abstain in your remarks on my book, 
 had been abundantly bestowed upon me by your 
 allies and friends, a short time before those 
 remarks were given to the public. Sir, do 
 not claim henceforward that moderation of lan- 
 guage on my part, which your courtly phrases 
 demand. You must (by me at least) be consi- 
 dered a compound character, made up of what 
 you do yourself, and what you let others do for 
 you. It is preposterous to expect that I should 
 address you as it is fitting for but one half of my 
 antagonist: that I should have you always before 
 my eyes as you appear when alone upon paper, 
 and lose sight of you when you choose to mix 
 with a riotous crowd. No, Sir; that must not be. 
 You cannot expect a return for your personal 
 moderation, in full : we must certainly deduct 
 from it your share in the unbounded indig- 
 
104 ATTACKS OF THE 
 
 nation which your joint-stock company of inso- 
 lence and libel, deserves. 
 
 .Asa member of an Association which musters 
 its forces to fall upon me with all the rage of an 
 infuriated mob, you could not escape the charge 
 of trying to overpower me by means of your 
 friends, even if you had been absent from the 
 meeting. Your absence on that occasion would 
 have all the appearance of Jesuitical caution. 
 Nothing but a serious and indignant opposition 
 to the conduct of your associates; nothing but a 
 direct reprobation of the vile means which they 
 employed in assisting you, could free you from 
 the strong suspicion that they acted in concert 
 with you. Yet, far from thus preventing the charge 
 of gross unfairness which now lies against you, 
 you, Sir, appear to have been present at the meet- 
 ing, where filth and slander were heaped upon 
 my name. On what principle of conduct you 
 acted on that occasion I am not able to guess. 
 From the idea, however, which your works have 
 given me of your mental character, I have no 
 doubt you acted with the utmost precision, ac- 
 cording to some previously settled rule. I myself 
 
CATHOLIC ASSOCIATION. 105 
 
 am no good judge of such highly drilled minds. 
 I was born under warmer skies, and do not pre- 
 tend to such exquisite judgment, such a well 
 trained set of obedient feelings. I know, that 
 had you been treated in my presence, with half 
 the indignity that fell to my lot in yours, I should 
 have found it impossible not to protest against 
 the treachery of insulting my opponent in his 
 absence. I should have blushed at the idea of 
 having afterwards to contend with a man whom 
 I had allowed to be hustled, and pummelled, and 
 mauled by a mob of my own party. 
 
 But judgment and coolness, though very en- 
 viable, may be carried too far. In the case of 
 which I speak, one grain of mere feeling would 
 have done you and your cause a most material 
 service. Indeed, though the golden opportunity 
 has irrevocably escaped you, I cannot help ex- 
 periencing that kind of uneasiness which follows 
 an escape from danger. A single remonstrance, 
 a mere cry of " order" from you, when my name 
 was bandied from mouth to mouth in scorn, 
 would have brought more credit and weight to 
 your bad cause, than it can expect from all your 
 
106 ATTACKS OF THE 
 
 knowledge and ingenuity. I have, Sir, to thank 
 you for nothing but your silence on that occasion. 
 Had the speech in which I was calumniated 
 and reviled, been made among that kind of rabble 
 for which its style is fitted, I would never have 
 condescended to take notice of it ; but as it has 
 your countenance, and the room abounded in 
 doctors of the Sorbonne, and all manner of Ro- 
 manist Ecclesiastics, it is my determination to 
 rescue it out of a mere Magazine, and preserve 
 it in a more permanent kind of volume, as a 
 specimen of the taste and the spirit of your As- 
 sociation. You will, therefore, find it word for 
 word, as far as it relates to me, at the bottom of 
 these pages. I earnestly request you to refresh 
 your recollection of its passages (as I entreat my 
 readers not to proceed without perusing them), 
 and beg your attention to the few words with 
 which I am about to conclude this letter *. 
 
 * " Nor is this all ; for our clerical opponents, not satisfied 
 with their own labours, have set up a strange sort of gentle- 
 man, with two or three English names, and two or three 
 Spanish names, to write against us. I allude to the Reve- 
 rend Blanco, &c. White, &c. This man's vile production has 
 
CATHOLIC ASSOCIATION. 107 
 
 X. 
 
 I do not know whether the Roman Catholics of 
 England collectively are faithfully represented in 
 
 been circulated with most malignant zeal. I shall, with your 
 permission, notice some of its peculiarities ; and first of all, 
 let us see who and what the gentleman is and was. (Mr. Mac- 
 donnell here produced a small book). I shall take his story 
 from his own book ; I will not diminish its influence by com- 
 municating to you any information that may have reached 
 me from other quarters. 'Tis true, the story of his migra- 
 tion from Seville was not precisely the same as he gives us ; 
 for I had heard, that so far from flying from his native city 
 to avoid an enemy, he marched out, like a good recruit in a 
 good cause, to the tune of *' the Girl I left behind me" 
 (laughter). The title of his book is The Poor Man's 
 Preservative against Popery, addressed to the lower classes of 
 Great Britain and Ireland.' Oh, what a chance he has in 
 Ireland ! (loud cheers and laughter.) ' By the Rev. Joseph 
 Blanco White.' Now, before we go farther, I beg to know 
 where he borrowed the title of Reverend ? As Popery is so 
 hideous a thing, it surely could not confer such a title ; or if, 
 on the contrary, the title was conferred by Popery, and is 
 still held under that license, then it follows that Popery is 
 not so hideous a thing after all. Let him tell the world by 
 
108 ATTACKS OF THE 
 
 their British Catholic Association. If they be, I 
 confidently appeal to those, who, free from the 
 
 whom he was ordained or dubbed a Reverend, and then we 
 shall have one proof of the sincerity of his present opinions 
 as to Popery. He says, that the author makes no profit 
 by this pamplet ; ' and I can assure you that neither will the 
 reader (loud laughter). His modesty will not allow him to 
 put forth all his titles on this occasion, but I find a small 
 number of them appended to his venerable name in a similar 
 production. As he announces his title and dignities as M. A. 
 and B.B., I do not know exactly what B. B. means, unless, 
 perhaps, Beautiful Blanco ; but so it is * Joseph Blanco 
 White, M.A. and B.B. in the University of Seville; Licen- 
 tiate of Divinity in the University of Osuna ; formerly Chap- 
 lain Magistral Preacher to the King of Spain, in the Royal 
 Chapel at Seville ; Fellow, and once Rector, of the College 
 of St. Mary a Jesu, of the same town ; Synodal Examiner of 
 the Diocese of Cadiz ; Member of the Royal Academy of 
 Belles Lettres of Seville.' Verily, Sir, by his own account, my 
 friend Blanco appears to have been the Caleb 2uotem of all 
 Spain, and Paul Pry of Seville (loud laughter). But let us 
 hear his own story from himself, and his qualifications for the 
 mission he has undertaken. He begins by informing us, that 
 his family left Ireland. I should be glad to learn from him 
 why they left Ireland ? Oh, unhappy man, were they not 
 banished from their native land by that infernal code which 
 you now seek to perpetuate (hear, hear) ? He says that he 
 
CATHOLIC ASSOCIATION. 109 
 
 religious and political feelings of that party, have 
 read the fragment at the bottom of these pages, 
 
 had excellent parents : that is more than they can say for 
 their son, even by his own account. At the age of fourteen, 
 he pressed his parents to educate him for the priesthood, and 
 they performed his desires with the most tender, diligent, 
 and affectionately parental solicitude. He praises those poor 
 parents as the best of creatures, and particularly his mother, 
 as the most charitable of women. He was ordained a priest 
 at the age of twenty-five. He enters upon the discharge of 
 all the duties of the ministry : he got into the enjoyment of 
 several offices in the church, of which we have already seen 
 some specimens ; on each of those occasions he renewed, I 
 believe upon oath, his vows of attachment to the Catholic 
 religion ; and yet this man, who is to convert our poor people 
 to Christianity, admits that, for ten years of the time, he 
 was a false double-dealer and an infidel, and that he con- 
 tinued, from interested motives, to discharge the ministry of 
 a religion which he believed to be a false religion ! These 
 are his avowals ; perhaps they are intended for boastings ; 
 but, after such declarations, the man deserves to be deceived 
 who chooses thee, Blanco, for his religious director. He 
 tells us, that when he ceased to be a Catholic, he became an 
 infidel. This was quite according to precedent ; for when 
 angels fell, they became devils. Well, Sir, he quits Seville, 
 and finds his way to a vessel, and sets sail for England. 
 Really, Sir, these Spanish friars, whom our roving missionaries 
 
110 ATTACKS OF THE 
 
 whether the spirit that actuated their ancestors 
 round the Smithfield fires, is not still alive under 
 
 pick up, are strange fellows. I recollect reading, a year or two 
 ago, an account of another Spanish friar, who had been de- 
 coyed to Gibraltar, and was shipped for England, consigned 
 to Mr. Joseph Butterworth. The story was told in one of 
 the speeches of a Bible meeting. This poor friar, on coming 
 into your river, was annoyed by your foggy atmosphere. 
 The fable is given just as if it were a Jamaica turtle, instead 
 of a Spanish friar that was the subject. The poor animal was 
 delivered over to his consignee, who, full of benevolence, 
 sent him to one of the hospitals of your city, where he died 
 in two days ; and * there was an end of the friar done over' 
 (laughter). But to return to Blanco : he tells us a cock and 
 bull story about his being converted by humming a hymn in 
 some church in this city ; and it happened most fortunately, 
 but quite accidentally, of course, that the system of Protes- 
 tantism which he preferred was that of the established 
 church. Well, Sir, he goes forth, qualified, as he declares, 
 for this Christian mission, in the extraordinary manner to 
 which I have adverted. He afflicted both his parents, he 
 broke his poor mother's heart, he violated all his vows of at- 
 tachment to his religion and this man, who is by himself 
 represented to have been an infidel to his country, an infidel 
 to his king, an infidel to his religion, an infidel to his parents, 
 and an infidel to his God, now assumes the office of religious 
 director of the " Lower classes of Great Britain and Ireland " 
 
CATHOLIC ASSOCIATION. Ill 
 
 another form in their breasts ? No : let no man 
 whose unfortunate lot has been to be born within 
 
 (hear, hear). This Christian Crusader does not preach doc- 
 trines of charity among us ; oh, no, in the outset of his 
 career he unfurls his hlood-red banner of persecution, with 
 his most Christian motto of " hate one another," inscribed 
 upon its scroll. Oh, most amiable Christian missionary! 
 most admirable guide for a Christian people ! most admirable 
 ally of a Christian hierarchy (hear, hear) ! The most comical 
 part of all is, that this man, who had been an infidel for so 
 many years, now tenders himself to be examined upon oath 
 Blanco's oath (laughter) ! He charges us with a fixed belief in 
 the infallibility of the pope. Now, to that I answer, that I 
 have sworn, as all of you have done, that I do not believe 
 any such thing ; and without claiming any extra measure of 
 credit for myself, I think my oath is as good as Blanco's 
 (loud laughter). Next, he charges us with not keeping faith 
 with persons of a different communion. That comes well 
 from Blanco, who, by his own account, kept faith with 
 neither God nor man for ten years of his life (hear !). Besides, 
 who can tell whether he is not playing the same game with 
 the established church of England, as he played with the 
 established chnrch of Spain ? Who can tell what is Blanco's 
 religion this day ; or, though you may be quite sure of it to- 
 day, who can promise what it will be to-morrow ? (hear, 
 hear !) But, Sir, it is not to be endured, that these vile 
 calumnies should be circulated against a portion of his ma- 
 
H2 ATTACKS OF THE 
 
 their Church, and has left it ; let not that man ex- 
 pect to find a spark of charity among them 
 
 jesty's subjects, who have been distinguished for their good 
 faith to their sovereign under the most trying circumstances, 
 and to their fellow-subjects upon all occasions. The same 
 may be said as to his observations upon our allegiance ; for, 
 surely, the field of Waterloo is a more safe evidence than the 
 calumnious pages of Blanco upon this subject (loud cheers). 
 ' Oh, but then,' quoth Blanco, ' your doctrine of exclu- 
 sive salvation.' Upon that I shall only say, that, even if 
 our doctrines were such as our enemies impute to us, still we 
 should not be as bad as Blanco or his allies. For they do 
 not even charge us with any thing more than entertaining an 
 opinion as to what may be done in the next world, and not 
 by ourselves either ; whereas they, on the contrary, would 
 exclude us from any enjoyments in this world or the next. 
 They impute a doctrine or belief of exclusive right to us, but 
 they enforce an actual practical exclusion against us (hear, 
 hear). He complains next of the tyranny of popery. The 
 tyranny of popery indeed ! well said, Blanco: what a meek, 
 benevolent, and social being you have become since you aban- 
 doned it ? Does not your book now before me confound all 
 such pretensions, when its whole object is to aid the main- 
 tenance of a most tyrannical system (cheers) ? One of the 
 specimens of religious tyranny may be collected from this 
 book ; but I should recommend him, if he means to hold his 
 ground with the parsons, to exclude the passage from his 
 
CATHOLIC ASSOCIATION. 113 
 
 charity did I say? no, not of common humanity. 
 If they cannot feast their eyes upon his burning 
 
 next edition, as the practice which it suggests might be 
 found not a little inconvenient. He tells us (page 2), " it is 
 the custom in Spain, when certain places become vacant in 
 cathedrals and other great churches, to invite as many 
 clergymen as will allow themselves to be examined before the 
 public, to stand candidates for the vacancy. After the trial 
 of their learning, the judges, appointed by law, give the 
 place to him whom they believe to be most competent." 
 Now, such a custom would never do for our " cathedrals or 
 other great churches*" for certain reasons ; and therefore I 
 trust, that Blanco may not repeat the suggestion. But before 
 he repeats the charge of tyranny against Catholics, I beg 
 that he may obtain a return of the committals to Gaols and 
 Bridewells in Great Britain and Ireland, for a month or a 
 year, distinguishing those signed by the parsons, and he may 
 then, perhaps, be induced to abstain from a repetition of this 
 charge. He says that Popery sets parents as spies over their 
 children, and dilates in enthusiastic hate upon the Inquisition. 
 He cannot abhor the principle or practice of the Inquisition 
 more than I do ; but he must have known that the Pope has 
 actually discountenanced it in Spain, and that it is retained 
 merely as a political engine, if it be retained now at all. But, 
 why should this prop and panegyrist of our penal code intro- 
 duce this topic ? Does not he know that more cruelties and 
 persecutions have been inflicted by that code than by all the 
 agents of the Inquisition all over the globe ? that one of the 
 
 I 
 
114 ATTACKS OF THE 
 
 limbs ; if they cannot encourage the executioners 
 with their yells, they still howl their cheers round 
 
 first objects of that code was to darken the national under- 
 standing, to make the wife the informer against the hus- 
 band, and the child the plunderer of his parent? If he 
 wishes to search out the best and most operative system of 
 persecution, it is not to the black diaries of the horrible In- 
 quisition, but to the blacker pages of the more horrible statute 
 law of England that he must turn his perverse attention 
 (cheers). He next lectures us upon a subject which has 
 very much occupied, of late, the cares of our Thaumaturguses 
 of the press, from Devon to Durham. He is very diffuse 
 upon the subject of auricular confession. It is not necessary 
 for me to defend this great provision in this assembly, where 
 all its blessings are so justly appreciated, and most of all by 
 the parents who form a part of our meeting. * * * * 
 ******** Blanco, instead of taking the text 
 of his instructions from the sacred volume, extracted it from 
 the advice of his nearly namesake Banquo, who addresses 
 Macduff thus : 
 
 ' Dear Duff, I pr'ythee contradict thyself, 
 And say it is not so.' ' : 
 
 I do not feel at liberty to insert the low buffoonery of the 
 speaker against two other individuals whom he chose to asso- 
 ciate with me : and have accordingly made a break in the 
 speech. I beg leave to add, that I had no knowledge of it till 
 two days before I began this Letter. 
 
CATHOLIC ASSOCIATION. 115 
 
 some heartless man, whom they employ to torture 
 their victim by the only means now left them 
 insult and calumny. Sir, in asserting this, I have 
 not lost sight of you. You were one of the crowd 
 who assembled at your British Auto da I\ to be 
 present at the concerted murder of my reputation 
 and character. If that character can (and it must) 
 survive the impotent efforts of the Associated Ca- 
 tholics, it is not owing to any limits or measure 
 which they have set to their malice. 
 
 There is, Sir, but one assertion, in the vile 
 libel which you sanctioned with your presence, 
 which is pretended to have been derived from any 
 other authority than my own statements : and as 
 the speaker did scarcely trouble himself to distort 
 and pervert my narrative, but referred to my 
 works when he was asserting the very reverse of 
 what is therein stated, I will not degrade myself 
 by answering falsehoods which are already con- 
 tradicted. 
 
 I must, however, submit to the necessity, humi- 
 liating though it is, of noticing the charge which 
 he pretends to have derived from other sources. 
 
 Monstrous, indeed, and unheard-of, must be the 
 
 i 2 
 
116 ATTACKS OF THE 
 
 profligacy which would oblige a Spanish clergy- 
 man to fly. You cannot, Sir, be ignorant no 
 one acquainted with the Roman Catholic priest- 
 hood, especially abroad, is ignorant that the 
 celibacy of the clergy is kept up by a tacit com- 
 promise between individuals and the Church. 
 They are to give her the credit of their professed 
 purity ; she is not to molest them for their evasions 
 of her monstrous law. Hardly any appearances 
 are required to be kept. I assert this positively, 
 and defy your ingenuity to disprove it. Would 
 to Heaven your Church were determined in 
 earnest to enforce purity among her clergy. The 
 necessity of constant exposure, would soon show 
 the wickedness of the law which produces such 
 an enormous mass of vice. That I have not lived 
 innocent towards my God, I have confessed before 
 the world. But my life, if judged even by the 
 strictest rules of that world's most strict law, has 
 been, Sir, without spot or stain. I left Seville the 
 day before the French entered it, and 1 left it with 
 three of nay near relations. One of them was an 
 ecclesiastic, whose advanced age and well-known 
 attachment to his Church for he was a member 
 
CATHOLIC ASSOCIATION. 117 
 
 of the Inquisition at once show the improba- 
 bility of his accompanying me in my supposed 
 flight for a love affair. 
 
 Father Joseph White, the Dominican, com- 
 monly known in Spain by the name of Padre 
 Blanco, may still be remembered in this country ; 
 for once he showed me a list of, I believe, two 
 hundred I may say one hundred with certainty 
 English Protestants whom he had made prose- 
 lytes to his Church. That zealous missionary of 
 your faith was, I am pretty sure, personally known 
 to a gentleman nearly related to you ; and so 
 were, to my certain knowledge, the other mem- 
 bers of my family who fled from the French with 
 me. I had to wait near a month at Cadiz before 
 I sailed for this country, and frequented, as usual, 
 the table and society of the first people of that 
 town, including the house of Mr. (afterwards) Sir 
 James Duff, the British Consul, an old friend of 
 my family, whose certificate, as to the circum- 
 stances which make me a British subject by 
 law, I have in my possession. But why do I 
 prolong this humiliating defence, when I can at 
 once give the lie to the impudent calumny of my 
 
118 ATTACKS OF THE 
 
 having quitted Spain for any other cause but that 
 which I have stated. You, Sir, and your Asso- 
 ciates., must know that my office in the Royal 
 Chapel at Seville was kept open for me till the 
 latter end of 1815, five years after I quitted Spain. 
 I was on the point of stating this fact in the account 
 of myself which I have presented to the public ; 
 but a reluctance to say too much in my own fa- 
 vour, made me omit it, with several other circum- 
 stances of the same kind. Since you listened, 
 Sir, to the slander, have the goodness to attend 
 to the details of the fact which at once dis- 
 proves it. 
 
 The Statutes of the Royal Chapter to which I 
 belonged, ordain, that if any of its members 
 should absent himself without the king's leave, 
 his stall shall be kept open for him three years, 
 without however his deriving any emolument from 
 it.. The French having entered Seville the day 
 after I left that town, dispossessed all public func- 
 tionaries, and all beneficed clergymen, who did 
 not return to acknowledge Joseph Buonaparte 
 within a certain period. My name was accord- 
 ingly in the Gazette, as having forfeited my stall. 
 
CATHOLIC ASSOCIATION. 119 
 
 Caring nothing about it, I allowed things to take 
 their course. 
 
 During my longest residence at Oxford, on the 
 8th of July, 1815, I received a letter from my 
 father, dated 10th of the preceding June, by 
 which I was informed, that the Capellan Mayor., 
 or Dean, had requested him to ask for my resigna- 
 tion, lest, if the chaplaincy lapsed, the crown 
 should appoint to it without the usual trial of 
 the candidates, and subsequent presentation by 
 the chapter. I was now surprised at finding 
 myself still a chaplain to the King of Spain ; 
 for being extremely anxious not to mention to 
 my father, in the correspondence which I con- 
 stantly carried on with him till his death, any 
 thing relating to my Spanish preferment, I took 
 it for granted that a successor had been given me 
 at the Royal Chapel. I learnt, however, that 
 when the French were driven out of Spain, all 
 those who had been ejected by Joseph had been 
 reinstated in their places. From that moment the 
 three years began to be reckoned by my Chapter, 
 who considered the preceding absence as forced, 
 and occasioned by the occupation of a hostile 
 army and an intrusive government. All this took 
 
120 ATTACKS OF THE 
 
 place unknown to me, as I derived no emolu- 
 ment at all in consequence of my restoration, 
 Three days, however, after having received my 
 father's letter (I chose that day because it was 
 my fortieth birthday), I sent by the post a letter 
 of resignation, which I had drawn up the day be- 
 fore, in such terms, as, without disclosing my 
 religious feelings to my father, might at a future 
 period be explained by the circumstance of my 
 adherence to the English Church, into a solemn 
 protest against Popery, and an assertion made to 
 those who knew me best, that Popery alone had 
 moved me to quit my country, and every thing I 
 loved in it*. Sir, I have proved that for five years 
 I had it in my power to resume the honourable 
 place I had occupied in Spain: if such a fact 
 does not convince you, and yours of the Associa- 
 tion, of the freedom, disinterestedness, and sincerity, 
 of my choice, you must be acquainted with depths 
 of hypocrisy and duplicity, which, though I have 
 lived so long among the instruments of Romish 
 tyranny, it has never been my chance to fathom, 
 
 * The Spanish letter, and an English translation, will be 
 found at the end of this volume. 
 
CATHOLIC ASSOCIATION. 121 
 
 I was on the point of giving some select names, 
 out of the numerous individuals of high rank and 
 respectability, both English and Spanish, who, 
 from their own knowledge, and the general esteem 
 in which they found me held in Spain, are ready 
 to contradict the infamous slander propagated by 
 your Association, concerning the cause of my 
 exile. I had asked their leave for that purpose, 
 and the letters I have received in answer I will 
 preserve with gratitude and pride. But having 
 already given an unanswerable contradiction to the 
 calumny of your Association (not, however, for 
 their sakes, but out of respect to such of my 
 English readers as may know nothing more of 
 me but what I have said in my book), I will 
 not descend so low as to give references for 
 character*. 
 
 * There is one reference which I am bound in duty and 
 gratitude to give, because, highly honourable as that reference 
 is to me, my being entitled to give it is not less honour- 
 able to the truly amiable, liberal, and benevolent mind of 
 the nobleman, who, notwithstanding the tendency of my 
 late works against a political measure to which he has sacri- 
 ficed his personal interests through life; is still ready to 
 
122 ATTACKS OF THE 
 
 Of the inoffensiveness of my conduct in Eng- 
 land, especially since I began to prepare myself, 
 
 show himself, what he has been for many years, my affec- 
 tionate friend. The Right Honourable Lord Holland knew 
 me during his last visit to Spain in 1809 ; and from that period 
 till the present moment, I have received uninterrupted and in- 
 creasing proofs of his esteem. His house was one of the first 
 I visited, when, in 1810, I arrived in London ; and for sixteen 
 years I have been either a frequent visitor, or an inmate in it. 
 For two years I was tutor to the Honourable Henry Fox, a 
 charge with which his noble father honoured me of his own 
 accord, and in spite of the fears 1 expressed, that my growing 
 ill health might disqualify me for its important duties. Lord 
 Holland's rank entitled him to be my Patron; but he chose to 
 be my friend; indeed, the letter he has written to me from 
 Paris, upon hearing that my character had been slandered, 
 would show the name of friend too weak, and require some 
 other, little short of a brother, to explain the feelings it ex- 
 presses. Great, indeed, must be the candour, and almost sin- 
 gular the goodness of heart, from which I receive such ample 
 justice : but tried also (1 thank God) must be the purity of 
 intention, which so effectually has screened me from every 
 suspicion, which might have lowered me, if not in the respect, 
 in the affection of my noble friend. To me there is scarcely 
 a stronger proof of my sincerity than the pain 1 have endured, 
 from the moment when I began to fear, that in the discharge 
 of a paramount duty, I might disturb the course of that long- 
 
CATHOLIC ASSOCIATION. 123 
 
 by prayer and study, to become a member of her 
 Church, I thank God I have a witness in every 
 person that knows me, and I have not lived in 
 obscurity. 
 
 As this, Sir, is a fact which the utmost malice 
 of your Associates cannot even obscure, their efforts 
 to represent my conduct in Spain as odious and 
 highly immoral, must recoil upon that Church of 
 Rome, which they are trying to defend by such 
 infamous means. It is sufficiently glorious to the 
 Church of England to have been the instrument 
 which restored Christian faith and hope to my 
 soul. Your friends, Sir, should be more cautious, 
 not to acknowledge in the English Church a 
 power which she does not claim for herself: they 
 should not attribute to her the miracle, of having 
 converted a monster, such as you heard me de- 
 scribed, into a Christian, who has now lived in 
 her bosom so many years, " touching the righte- 
 ousness which is in the law, blameless/' 
 
 To have been consenting, like Saul, to the 
 moral murder of one of your fellow Chris- 
 enjoyed and most highly-valued affection. But I did not know 
 the full extent of Lord Holland's candour and benevolence. 
 
124 ATTACKS OF THE 
 
 tians, is a stain in your hitherto fair cha- 
 racter for humanity and benevolence, which you 
 will find it difficult to wipe away. But to be- 
 hold, in silent approbation, that brother Chris- 
 tian tortured with a brutality, which exceeds that 
 of the barbarians, who delight in dissecting alive 
 the victims on whose limbs they are prepared to 
 feast, is beyond what I could have conceived 
 possible in a man of your reputation. Sir, there 
 are spots in the human heart, so sensitive and 
 tender, that, like the pupil of the eye, no degree 
 of criminality can justify their being fixed upon 
 to inflict pain as a punishment. Those recesses 
 of the breast, which have been consecrated by 
 filial and parental love, should not, in any case, 
 be subjected to the knife of the moral executioner. 
 He, whom the British Catholic Association em- 
 ployed to wreak their vengeance upon me, 
 selected, Sir, those very spots to make me writhe 
 with pain. Yes, Sir, I will yield him that 
 triumph : he has, indeed, maddened my soul with 
 agony, by charging me with having " broken 
 my mother's heart." She is no more, Sir ; and 
 fifty years have past since my head rested first 
 
CATHOLIC ASSOCIATION. 125 
 
 upon her bosom. But God witnesses the tears 
 which stream from my eyes at this moment, when 
 I am forced to appeal to her blessed spirit, for 
 the falsehood of the charge, which your asso- 
 ciates have brought against me. Even when her 
 mind was under the influence of those errors 
 which she imbibed from your Church, she would 
 have indignantly flung the brutal falsehood on 
 the man who uttered it against her child. Her 
 misery on my account was owing to the wicked 
 tyranny of a religious system, which by oaths, 
 as well as by threats of death and infamy, too 
 sure to be put into execution by a court of her 
 priests, secures the external obedience of her 
 members ; leaving their minds to the chance of 
 believing or rejecting her tenets. That Church, 
 which should be the guide, is made, by her im- 
 pious ambition, the most fatal snare to her chil- 
 dren She it is, that tenders an oath, which not 
 only attests present belief, but, no less wickedly 
 than absurdly, binds her slaves to keep her 
 faith (whether they should ^in future find it true 
 or false), " by God's grace unto their lives' 
 end." It is your Church which thus places 
 thousands of her unfortunate followers between 
 
126 ATTACKS OF THE 
 
 contending duties, if that can be called a duty, 
 which implies that God is the supporter of what 
 we conscientiously believe to be false, and con- 
 trary to his revealed word. I was, Sir, one of 
 those victims ; and awful, indeed, was the strug- 
 gle between my love for my parents, and my 
 natural abhorrence of dissimulation. Had there 
 been the least grain of hypocrisy in my com- 
 position, I might, like many others, have in- 
 dulged my passions without the necessity of 
 much concealment, have lived in the enjoyment 
 of my mother's happiness ; and should, most 
 probably, be at this moment holding the highest 
 honours of the Church of Spain, with no more 
 conformity with her tenets than the external, 
 which has at all times sufficed to many of her 
 dignitaries and bishops. But I abhorred decep- 
 tion ; yet could not fly from the theatre of im- 
 posture, in which I was a forced actor in chains. 
 Had those chains been of no stronger materials 
 than worldly interest, or even fear of being 
 brought back to the Inquisitorial dungeons from 
 my flight, T should have snapt them like withs ; 
 but they were rivetted on my parents' hearts, 
 and I could not break them without making 
 
CATHOLIC ASSOCIATION. 127 
 
 those hearts bleed. My mother was a woman 
 of the most extraordinary quickness and sensi- 
 bility; and notwithstanding the caution which 
 my tenderness for her demanded, as a paramount 
 duty ; the struggle of my mind could not escape 
 her piercing eye. I sacrificed ten years of suf- 
 fering to what I conceived the first, the clearest 
 of my contending duties : I did not quit Spain 
 (as all my bosom friends knew that I was deter- 
 mined to do, whenever I could accomplish it 
 without " breaking my parents' heart "), till the 
 approach of a hostile army put it in my power. 
 My regard for the feelings of my parents was 
 such, that in qualifying myself as a clergyman 
 of the Church of England, I avoided every cir- 
 cumstance which might convey my change to 
 their ear. No, no; guilty of many a sin, I 
 confess myself before Heaven ; but unfeelingness 
 towards those who gave me my being, was never, 
 to my knowledge, recorded before HIM, at whose 
 tribunal both you and I must, ere long, stand. 
 
 J. B. W. 
 
APPENDIX. 
 
 Copy and Translation of the Resignation of his Office 
 in the Spanish Church, tendered by the Author 
 in 1815. 
 
 AL 
 
 ILUSTRISIMO SENOR CAPELLAN MAYOR, 
 
 Y CABILDO DE CAPELLANES DE LA REAL CAP1LLA DE 
 
 SAN .FERNANDO, DE SEVILLE. 
 
 ILUSTRISIMO SE&OR; 
 
 Mucho tiempo ha que hubiera dirigido a V. S. 
 I lima, mi desestimiento de la Capellania Magistral que he 
 tenido el honor de poseer en esa Real Capilla, a no haber sido 
 por la consideracion de que, estando ausente sin licencia, y no 
 disfrutando de ningun emolumento que pudiese comprometer 
 mi delicadeza sobre este punto, podia retardar este paso hasta 
 la conclusion de los tres anos que los Estatutos conceden ; 
 dexando asi que el tiempo reconciliase a mi familia con la 
 separacion perpetua que mi renuncia debe anunciarles. Pero 
 estando el te*rmino para concluirse, y entendiendo yo que V. S. 
 Illma. tiene la bondad de esperar a saber mi determinacion 
 para publicar las Oposiciones a mi vacante, dirijo esta carta 
 para que la tenga V. S. Illma. como documento de la renuncia 
 formal y absoluta que hago de la Capellania Magistral que 
 obtuve y he disfrutado en esa Real Capilla. 
 
 En medio del inevitable dolor que la memoria de quanto me 
 es y ha sido caro en mi ciudad nativa me causa en este mo- 
 
APPENDIX. 129 
 
 mento, no puedo olvidarme de los buenos oficios y amistoso 
 trato que debo a ese Ilustre Cuerpo. Al paso pue& que doy 
 a V. S. Illma. mis mas sinceras gracias por todo, pido al Cielo 
 quelibre amipatria de los males en que, segun mis principles, 
 la considero envuelta, y que son la unica causa de la separacion 
 dolorosa e irrevocable que en este instante confirmo. 
 Dios guarde a V. S. Illma. muchos ahos. 
 
 B. L. M. de V. S. Illma. su atento Servidor, 
 
 J. BLANCO WHITE. 
 Oxford, 10 de Julio, 1815. 
 
 Translation. 
 
 TO 
 
 THE MOST ILLUSTRIOUS THE HEAD CHAPLAIN, 
 
 AND CHAPTER OF CHAPLAINS OF THE ROYAL CHAPEL 
 
 OF ST. FERDINAND, OF SEVILLE. 
 
 MOST ILLUSTRIOUS SIR ; 
 
 I would long since have addressed to you * my 
 resignation of the Magistral Chaplaincy, which I have had 
 the honour to have held in that Royal Chapel, had I not con- 
 sidered, that being absent without leave, and receiving no 
 emolument, which might make my delicacy on such matters 
 at all questionable, I might put off that measure to the con- 
 clusion of the three years, which are granted by the Statutes ; 
 
 * The repetition of the usual title of such bodies in Spain is 
 omitted in the translation. 
 
130 APPENDIX. 
 
 so that, by this means, time might reconcile my family to the 
 perpetual separation which my resignation must intimate to 
 them. But the term being on the point of expiring, and 
 hearing that you have the goodness to wait for my resolution 
 before you publicly announce the competition * to fill up my 
 vacancy, I forward this Letter, which you may regard as a 
 document of the formal and absolute resignation, which I 
 thereby make of the Magistral Chaplaincy, which I obtained 
 and have enjoyed in that Royal Chapel. 
 
 Notwithstanding the inevitable pain, which the recollection 
 of every thing which has been and is still dear to me in my 
 native town is giving me at this moment, I cannot forget 
 the kindness and friendliness which I have experienced in 
 that illustrious body. In making, therefore, my most sincere 
 acknowledgments to you for all, / pray Heaven may deliver 
 my country from the evils f in which, according to my prin- 
 ciples, I believe she is involved; those evils which are exclu- 
 sively the cause of the painful and irrevocable separation which 
 I seal at this moment. 
 
 God preserve you, &c. 
 
 * The vacancy of such stalls as are called official, is published by 
 circulars, inviting Graduates to appear at the public competition, 
 called Oposiciones, which precedes the appointment. 
 
 f In the original sketch of this Letter, which I still preserve, I 
 find, that instead of the general word evils, I had written Religious 
 Intolerance. I altered the expression for the sake of my father, 
 through whose hands the Letter was forwarded. 
 
APPENDIX. 131 
 
 NOTE TO PAGE 12. 
 
 When the preceding sheets had nearly gone through the 
 press, I was favoured with a Letter from the Rev. Richard 
 Garnett, of Blackburn, from which I take leave to transcribe 
 the words of the Original Chronicle, out of which, subsequent 
 historians have taken that remarkable fact of the divine 
 worship paid to Pope Martin IV, by the Sicilian Legates. 
 After this, few, I trust, will deny, that any point in history is 
 better authenticated than that which shows, who is " the 
 man of sin the son of perdition ; who opposeth and exalteth 
 himself above all that is called God, or that is worshipped ; 
 so that he as God sitteth in the temple of God, shewing him- 
 self that he is God *." 
 
 " In questo tempo, parendo a quelli di Palermo havere 
 male fatto, e* sentendo 1'apparecchiamento grande che lo Re 
 Carlo faceva, per venire sopra di loro, mandarono per loro 
 ambasciadori frati religiosi a Papa Martino, dornandandoli 
 misericordia, proponendo in loro ambasciata solamente, Agnus 
 Dei qui tollis peccata mundi, miserere nobis ; Agnus Dei qui 
 tollis peccata mundi, miserere nobis ; Agnus Dei qui tollis pec- 
 cata mundi, dona nobis pacem : 41 Papa in pieno concestoro 
 fece loro questa risposta, senza altre parole, le quali parole 
 sono scritte nel Passio Domini nostri Jesu Christi, dicendo 
 cosi brevemente, Ave Rex Judeorum, et dabant eialapam : Ave 
 Rex Judeorum , et dabant e,i alapam: Ave Rex Jttdeorwn, et 
 dabant ei alapam. Onde gli ambasciadori si partirono molto 
 confusi." Giov. Villani, Historic Fiorentine, b. vii, c. Ixiii, 
 p. 206, ed. Venet. 1559. 
 
 My truly learned friend adds : " The above-mentioned em- 
 bassy took place in 1282, and John Villani began to write his 
 History in 1300, only eighteen years after." 
 
 * 2 Thess. ii, 3, 4. 
 THE END. 
 
IX)NDON : 
 
 PRINTED BY CHARLES WOOD, 
 Poppiu's Court, Fleet Street. 
 

 
 
 
TURN CIRCULATION DEPARTMENT 
 )-*> 202 Main Library 
 
 JAN PERIOD 1 
 IOME USE 
 
 2 
 
 3 
 
 
 5 
 
 6 
 
 Ml BOOKS MAY BE RECALLED AFTER 7 DAYS 
 
 Renewals and Recharges may be made 4 days prior to the due date. 
 
 Books may be Renewed by calling 642-3405 
 
 DUE AS STAMPED BELOW 
 
 RM NO. DD6 
 
 UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, BERKELEY 
 
 BERKELEY, CA 94720 
 
 $ 
 
?45253 
 
 8X 
 
 1/V6V 
 
 UNIVERSITY OF CAUFORNIA UBRARY 
 
 I