friendly confidence to the faith of the faithful, who repose on tradition, relying on their piety that it will make up his labour."

We confess, on reading such an avowal, we know not whether to admire the naiveté of these pretensions, or the prodigious audacity of such a system. What! You cannot establish by historical proofs, or even by tradition, the authenticity of this relic, and yet you draw the crowd to its feet; even you yourselves know not if you have the veritable coat without seam of the Saviour, and you demand for this robe, at least equivocal, the devotion, the contemplation, as you say, of your flock, of souls that Jesus Christ is willing to save, and of which he will demand an account from you in the great day of account! And you add, that it is to the faith of the faithful that you must address yourself; that their piety will supply the historical proofs which you want. What monstrous aberration! Who knows what is the origin of this tunic? Who knows what use it has served, what creature it has clothed? But faith supplies all. Perhaps the Apostles never preached the Gospel; what matters it? Faith supplies all. Perhaps the Christian Church was never founded! A calamity that! Faith supplies all; it can quite go beyond all historical demonstration.

Priests of the Church of Rome! your responsibility before God is immense. Your Divine Master has sent you to enlighten and to save souls, and you keep them in the grossest ignorance, in the most unworthy superstitions: creatures made in the image of God, and bought with a great price. You ought to be the light of the world, the salt of the earth, and you put the light under the bushel; you deprive the salt of its savour, or rather, you change it into an element of weakness and corruption. If you are sincere, see what impious war you make against the Gospel of Jesus Christ; if you employ your hierarchical power to promote the ambitious views of a worldly domination, consider what will be the consequences of a necessary reaction to you, to your country, and to those whom you lead. "My kingdom is not of this world," saith the Lord; and you say, "We will reign over the world." Who will be strongest, you or God? ADOLPHE DUPUY.

ON THE OATHS OF ALLEGIANCE TO THE POPE, WHICH ARE TAKEN BY ROMISH CATHOLICS. (Concluded from page 9.)

WE may, therefore, fitly ask, with Dr. O'Conor, "How can the Bishop's oath be reconciled with the oath of civil allegiance, which excludes all indirect temporal power of the Pope in this

realm?" And we may observe, with another Roman Catholic writer, Dr. Geddes: "a more absolute vassalage was never imposed on mankind by the most despotic Princes, than is here imposed on every Bishop by one of their own order, forgetting his own origin, and exalting himself above the sons of man."

Father Peter Walsh says plainly: "The Bishops have already, at their consecration, bound themselves liege-men to his Holiness, even by the very strictest oath that could be sworn or penned, especially, being the Pope himself, is the only interpreter thereof. Nay, we know they must be perjured to the Pope if they prove faithful to the King. Whether so or no to God? judge you. I am sure, if they were not traitors in taking the foresaid oath to his Holiness, they were at least renouncers of their allegiance to his Majesty, and of their obedience to the Catholic Church."

If any doubt on this subject remains, it will vanish on comparing this oath of feudal fealty with the oath of canonical obedience which was taken in the eighth century:

"I promise to thee, blessed Peter, Prince of the Apostles, and to thy Vicar, Pope Gregory, and his successors, by the indivisible Trinity, and by this thy most holy body, that I will shew forth the faith and purity of the Catholic religion, and through the operation of God, abide in the unity of the same faith, in which the salvation of Christians is fully proved to consist; and that I will in no wise consent to any person whatsoever advising me against the unity of the Universal Church; but, as I have said, I will in all things shew forth my faith and purity, and my attachment to thee, and to the welfare of thy Church, to which the power of binding and loosing has been given by God, and to thy aforesaid Vicar and his successors. And if I shall know of any prelates walking contrary to the rules of the holy fathers, I will hold no communion with them; but if I can, I will prevent them, if not, I will immediately give faithful notice to my apostolic superior."—See Digest, p. 2.

This is, really and truly, nothing but an oath of canonical obedience. It does not recognise the Pope as a temporal Prince nor does it appear to interfere with the duties of civil allegiance. What but inordinate and dangerous ambition led to the change?

There is also a clause in the oath taken by every priest of the Church of Rome at his ordination, which needs to be considered.

"I acknowledge the Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church of Rome as the mother and mistress of all Churches; and I promise and swear true obedience to the Roman Pontiff, the successor of Peter, and VICAR OF JESUS CHRIST; and all things defined, delivered, and declared by the holy canons and general councils, and especially by the Council of Trent, I do unhesitatingly receive and confess; and likewise I condemn and reject all things contrary thereto. This is the true faith, out of which there is no salvation: I will keep it firmly to my life's end, and will take care that it be kept by my subjects, and those of whom I may have charge. So help me God, and these holy gospels."-Dig. pp. 63, 64. "There are two points in it which deserve to be considered; the one, a declaration that the Pope is the Vicar or Vicegerent of Christ; and the other, a pledge that the Priest will maintain all the canons, and cause them to be maintained by all with whom he may have authority. Each of these declarations

contains, I think, matter objectionable to every Protestant Government; perhaps to all states, but more especially to Protestant states."—Dig. p. 64.

Under this title, "Vicar of Jesus Christ," a regal as well as a sacerdotal power has been expressly claimed by the Pope; and this power has never been limited or renounced. Pope Innocent III. declares the two powers in these words :—

"In token of spiritual, she (the Church) gave me a mitre; in token of temporal, a crown; a mitre for priestly power, a crown for regal; constituting me his Vicar, who hath written on his garment and on his thigh, King of kings, and Lord of lords, and a Priest for ever, after the order of Melchizedek."-Dig. 64, 65.

The same principles are distinctly set forth in the famous Bull "Unam Sanctam," by Boniface VIII. A curious illustration of this subject is found in the decretals of Pope Gregory IX. (printed at Turin, 1621): "Pope Clement III. to the most illustrious Emperor of Constantinople," chap 6.

"Besides you ought also to have known that God made two great lights in the firmament of heaven, the greater light to rule the day, and the lesser light to rule the night; each of them great, but one the greater of the two. For the firmament of the heaven, therefore, that is of the universal Church, God made two great lights, that is, he appointed two dignities, which are the pontifical authority and the kingly power. But that which rules the day, that is to say, spiritual things, is the greater, and that which rules carnal things, the lesser; so that the same difference may be discerned between the Popes and Kings as between the sun and moon."-Sketch of Romish Controversy, p. 316, 317.

On these last words, there is an instructive note:-" Since, therefore, the earth is seven times greater than the moon, and the sun is eight times greater than the earth, therefore the Pontifical dignity is forty-seven times greater than the Royal dignity."

When, then, the oath of allegiance to the spiritual Sovereign comes into collision with that to the temporal Sovereign, which must give way? Can we imagine that the claims of civil allegiance, in the mind of any devout Romanist, will be able to bear up against the weight of this spiritual authority, which (according to this truly admirable combination of astronomical with arithmetical knowledge) is forty-seven times greater? Can we wonder that when civil duties and spiritual duties-obedience to the laws of a Protestant country, and to a Protestant Sovereign -obedience to the Pope and his laws-come into collision, the former is found to kick the beam? A Romanist in Ireland might be willing enough to obey the laws of his country, and to be loyal to his Sovereign: but, alas! here is another duty-a duty to a foreign potentate, who is forty-seven times greater! Can we then wonder that, in fact, the laws of the Pope are obeyed, while the laws of this country are set at nought, by so large a portion of the Romanists in Ireland?

43

OUR CURATE.

(Continued from page 22.)

MR. HANSON, the late Curate of C, had felt an especial interest in the behalf of the lambs of his flock, nor had the number of those that congregated together for instruction diminished since the arrival of the new curate. Hugh had a kind manner and a sincere smile that won upon the hearts of the children. He would go from class to class, and from child to child, inquiring into their capacities, their tendencies, and their characters, with that interested demeanour which wins upon the hearts of the least observing. And then his frequent visits at their own homes; his affectionate conversations with their parents; the obliging deportment and attentive ear with which he adorned his calls at their humble cottages; the liberality of a kind heart, ever open to the appeals of indigence or distress; and the sympathizing attention with which he patiently heard their peculiar complaints, and gave his best advice for their need; all this made him highly popular, and quite overbalanced with many the cloudiness and mystification which seemed to hang over his pulpit ministrations. There were some who plainly saw that the doctrine propounded was diverse from that they had received, and that it afforded few internal proofs of its vital healthfulness and confirming power; but the less initiated were willing to attribute the change to their own dulness of comprehension, and to maintain the soundness of their new minister, as a living memento of the text he impressed upon them, "Faith without works is dead, being alone."

Maria M'Crie had been intrusted with a class of girls in the upper school-room; and Janet had the general superintendence of that portion of the school, while her brother acted the same part towards the boys' department below. The teachers were chiefly from the families of farmers in the neighbourhood, together with two daughters and a son of Mr. Hillyer, the "squire" of the locality. Before Hugh Scott's arrival it had been customary to open the proceedings with a form of prayer of a beautifully simple and child-like nature, composed by the late curate. But this was soon dispensed with, and one or two collects from the Church Service substituted in its place; which, touching and delightfully devotional in themselves, lost all their effect and character by the kind of monotonous chant in which he read them. It had also been usual for one or two of the more intelligent teachers to deliver an occasional address to the children, but on this a positive veto was at once decreed by the new minister. To be sure he had been already remonstrated with, and especially by Mr. Hillyer's family, who looked on such innovations with considerable fear and apprehension; and good as was the external order maintained in the school, still there

was evidently less relish for its occupations among the youthful members; but Hugh was firm in his alterations, and heard and answered with a grave dignity the objections gently advanced.

After opening the business of the morning he proceeded from one class to another, sometimes taking one for a short space, and with a good-tempered ease instructing the little ones that composed it. "Why, Mr. Blane," he said, pausing at the stool of a shock-headed farmer, who was hearing a little fellow repeat a hymn, "whose psalms is John Davies saying?"

"It's one of Isaac Watts' hymns for children, Sir," replied the good rustic. "Go on Johnny, and let Mr. Scott hear you finish it."

The boy was resuming at the words—

"Just such is the Christian. His race he begins

Like the sun in a mist when he mourns for his sins,
Then breaks"-

"But

But he was here interrupted by Hugh. "A good boy, and very well repeated," he said, patting the head of the child. these hymns are not what we ought to use in Church schools. I thought each class was provided with the authorized version of the Psalms in the Prayer-book-is it not so? And besides, you know, Mr. Blane, Dr. Watts, however good meaning a man, was sadly opposed to our Catholic Church."

"You mean he was a Dissenter, Sir?" answered Blane, turning rather red, and looking down at his shoes.

"Yes, and so a troubler of weak consciences, and of those for whom Christ died.' Very excellent may some of his hymns be, but we should for our own and our children's safety 'come out from among them, and be separate, and touch not the unclean thing.' But I interrupt you in your teaching. Now, my boys, if any of you have not a Book of Psalms, such you know as we sing at church, let him come to me after school and he shall have one."

So saying he passed on. Blane fidgeted about as the children looked anxiously in his face, and asked the puzzling question if Dr. Watts were a bad man? He quieted his conscience as well as he could by advising them to learn his hymns for the future, for their own private use, and the Church Psalms for repetition in school.

Another alteration also had Hugh made. The practice of a monthly review of the excellent Church Catechism was repealed, and a weekly examination in it introduced instead. He desired the teachers to make a shorter business of their own explanations of the Scriptures read by the children, and to spend more time in inculcating the doctrines involved in the above form. And it was very distressing for the teachers, as well as highly perplexing to the children, to mark the interruptions which the