a similar commutation is expressly authorized by the canons of our own church: vide Sparrow's Collection, Articuli pro clero, 1584; and Canons 1640, c. xiv. concerning Commutations. Such is the whole amount of the Romish doctrine and practice as to venal absolutions and indulgences." (!)

We have now closed our statement respecting the evidence furnished by the answers of the above-named distinguished universities, on the supposed grounds of Catholic morality. We trust also that our Protestant readers are not insensible to the force of the testimony we have laid before them, and that they are fully satisfied of the fallacy and misrepresentations upon which the prejudice, or rather the antipathy of sectarians against the morality of Catholic faith, has its foundation.

In reference to this subject, we again take pleasure in quoting from an article in the last-named journal, on the question of the Catholic emancipation, the following very spirited and appropriate remarks:

"If half the zeal and industry were employed to allay animosities and correct prejudices, among the uninstructed part of the population, that have unfortunately been exerted in disseminating falsehood and inflaming dissension, we have no sort of doubt that in a very short time the voice of the people of England would be unanimously in favor of the Catholic emancipation. The very feelings that have been suborned, by the basest misrepresentations, in support of the opposite cause, I would all lead them to this wise and benevolent conclusion. Their regard for their own safety, and the tranquillity and prosperity of the whole empire, would force them to seek the support of all the talent and enterprise which it can supply; and their brave fellow-subjects of Ireland would become the objects of their esteem and compassion, as soon as they were satisfied that they were not the proper objects of their moral antipathy. It is this ignorant, but honest prejudice against the supposed vices and corruptions of Catholics, fomented as it has been by the lowest and most assiduous calumnies, that has constituted the great strength of their opponents; and those who wish to see those machinations defeated, must, to give currency to truth, condescend to use something of the same exertions

which they have directed so unsparingly to secure the efficacy of slander."

In addition to the questions on the several points we have before enumerated, as proposed by Mr. Pitt to the Catholic universities, there is also a leading one on the Pope's civil authority, or right of interference out of his own temporal dominions. Their answers to this, it will be perceived, are the same as those made to the former, viz., that the charge is utterly destitute of truth. The University of Louvain, after expressing "its astonishment that such a question should, at the end of the 18th century, be proposed to any learned body, by the inhabitants of a kingdom which glories in the talents and discernment of its natives," answers distinctly, that “neither the Pope, nor the Cardinals, nor any body, or individuals of the Church of Rome, has any civil authority, power, jurisdiction, or pre-eminence whatever within the realm of England." And the other universities all give their answers in a tone equally distinct and satisfactory.

In the appendix of the same work, alluded to above, by Sir John Hippesley, there is a document written with great talent, which is taken from the class-book of the College of Maynooth, in which the same sentiments are enforced, as we have seen in the statements of the universities. It is there distinctly stated, that "Christ has not granted to St. Peter, or his successors, any power, direct or indirect, over the temporal concerns of kingdoms." And the following passage is the conclusion of a long argument, to show from what circumstances a contrary notion was maintained by some ambitious ecclesiastics in the earlier ages:

"It is not, therefore, surprising that the claim to this secondary and temporal influence and power, which the Bishops of Rome had long exercised, without objection, should, at last, have been confounded with their right to that primary and spiritual authority, which, alone, had been originally imparted by Christ to St. Peter, and transmitted from him by a line of regular succession to them; especially as the false decretals collected by Isidore in the 8th age, the ceremonies of the consecration

* Edinburgh Review, Nov. 1810. Art. I.

and inauguration of kings, and the conduct of princes, who ceased not to court their influence, were favorable to their pretensions to a divine right of interfering in the temporal concerns of states and kingdoms."

That such language as the above could be used by Catholics, we venture to assert, can with difficulty be credited by Protesants in general, who give themselves so little trouble in examining the real sentiments of the former, either on the character of their faith, or the history of their Church. Many, therefore, would be surprised to learn, that the usurped authority of certain ambitious prelates, in former days, is spoken of by all Catholics of the present time in a similar manner, and that these were also regarded in the same light by all Catholics, without exception, who were not involved in the political intrigues and parties from which these pretensions derived their unsanctioned and unlawful origin.

Although, at the present day, the number of those who seriously apprehend any danger to the state from the Pope's supposed right of interfering in civil affairs, or any such alarming effects upon the welfare of society as might very reasonably be expected from the supposed principles of the Catholic belief, it is, however, not to be forgotten that the prejudices which were originally created by these fictions, are far from having lost the practical mischief of their uncharitable and still deeply seated influence. And notwithstanding that experience has taught the more liberal and better informed of the utter groundlessness of their fears, there are not wanting numbers, of whom, in the language of Dr. Johnson, we may justly affirm, that while they can cry Popery! in the present times, would have cried fire! fire! in the time of the deluge.'

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* To the testimonies which we have adduced in the above essay, in behalf of Catholic truth, we take great pleasure in inserting the following from the British Critic for January last :

"If the Catholic religion be true, the view of truth which it discloses must be the very highest. It comprehends all moral, all spiritual excellence; the whole nature of angels and men, of all the living beings, and all the green things upon the earth; of the earth itself, of the sun, moon, and stars; of every thing which is visible, or sensible, or imaginable in the universe, with all their past and future history, seen according to the innermost realities

of their existence, in their only true relation to each other, and to the One Infinite, Almighty, Eternal, Incomprehensible, and Allperfect Being, who made and sustains them all. The mind is overpowered by the magnificence of such a revelation. It is evident that we have here not only the highest truth, but all truth, and nothing but truth; not only the highest beauty, but all beauty, and nothing but beauty."-P. 166.

THE USES OF ADVERSITY.

A PROTESTANT who has never read any writings of Catholic divines on the nature and uses of adversity, or, in other words, on the design and end of the innumerable "ills which flesh is heir to," as revealed to us through the benign light of Catholic interpretation, can have a very imperfect, or at best, a very meager conception on this subject of our healing and peace-giving religion. He has, to be sure, like the Catholic, the same heavenly discourse from the Mount, save, however, the same guarantee of an authorized text and faithful translation; but, then, how different is the feeling and the teaching with which its mysterious truths are associated, according to the distinctive interpretations of their respective creeds! The Catholic, by his faith, is taught, not only with pious submission to bear the afflictions of this present life, but even to embrace and welcome their visitation. This, however, he does not, indeed, for their own sake, nor through any natural love of pain or suffering, of what kind soever this may be, since it would be evidently opposed to all the original instincts of his constitution. The cause, then, of the principle we refer to, is to be sought only in the mysterious value and blessing which the consecrated influence of the Cross has shed upon the rugged, but yet peaceful road to future bliss.

In vain does the philosophy of this world-dignify it as we please with the names of Bacon, of Newton, or of Locke-furnish us with the solution of a question which belongs not to the law or the province of our natural being. Interrogate nature as we may, on such a point, whether in the immaterial world within, or in the physical world around, we shall only find her, on these grounds, as sullen and as silent as the grave itself to which she leads us, and where all her works at length must come and "sink in years."