crament of Baptism into an indelible brand of slavery: whoever has received the waters of regeneration, is the thrall of her who declares that there is no other church of Christ. She claims her slaves wherever they may be found, declares them subject to her laws, both written and traditional, and, by her infallible sanction, dooms them to indefinite punishment, till they shall acknowledge her authority and bend their necks to her yoke. Such is, has been, and will ever be, the doctrine of the Roman Catholic church; such is the belief of her true and sincere members; such the spirit that actuates her views, and which, by every possible means, she has always spread among her children. Him that denies this doctrine, Rome devotes to perdition. The principle of religious tyranny, supported by persecution, is a necessary condition of true Catholicism: he who revolts at the idea of compelling belief by punishment, is severed at once from the communion of Rome.

What a striking commentary on these canons of the Council of Trent have we in the history of

not an implicit belief in the assumed infallibility of men, who make a monopoly of the written word of God, prescribe the sense in which it must be understood, and with a refined tyranny, which tramples equally upon Christian liberty, and the natural rights of the human mind, insult even silent dissent, and threaten bodily punishment to such as, in silence and privacy, may have indulged the freedom of their minds *.

Such is the saving faith of the council of Trent! How different from that proposed by St. Paul, when he says, "if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead,

* Præterea ad coercenda petulantia ingenia, decernit (eadem sacrosancta synodus) ut nemo suœ prudentiœ innixus, in rebus fidei et morum, ad ædificationem doctrinæ Christianæ pertinentium, sacram Scripturam ad suos sensus contorquens, contra eum sensum quem tenuit et tenet sancta mater ecclesia, cujus est judicare de vero sensu et interpretatione Scripturarum sanctarum, aut etiam contra unanimem consensum sanctorum patrum, ipsam Scripturam sacram interpretari audeat, etiamsi hujusmodi interpretationes nullo unquam tempore in lucem edenda forent. Qui contravenerint per ordinarios declarentur, et pænis a jure statutis puniantur.—Decretum Concilii Trident. de editione et usu sacrorum librorum, Sessione IV.

thou shalt be saved *." "That is the word of faith which we preach," says St. Paul; and well might that faith be made the bond of union between all the churches which the Apostles saluted, without requiring a previous proof of their implicit submission. "Grace be with all them that love our Lord Jesus Christ in sincerity," is St. Paul's language. Cursed be they who, whatever be their love of Christ and veneration for the Scriptures, yield not obedience to the church of Rome; is the spirit of every page which has been published by Popes or councils.

Whatever might be the effect of the prejudices which the first reformers brought away from their Roman captivity; whatever the necessity which Protestant churches still acknowledge of preventing internal feuds, by proposing formularies of faith to their members, they have never so misunderstood "what spirit they are of" as to deny salvation to those who love their common Lord and Redeemer. Their churches, indeed, may differ on points which the subtilty of meta

* Rom. x.

physics had unfortunately started long before the reformation, and even before the publication of Christianity: they may observe different ceremonies, and adopt different views of church hierarchy and discipline; but their spirit is the only one which deserves the name of Catholic in the genuine sense of that word; the only spirit, indeed, which can produce, even on earth, an image of the glorious church which will exist for ever in one fold, and under one shepherd.

LETTER V.

Moral character of the Roman Church. Celibacy. Nunneries.

THE attempt to describe the moral character of a collective body, which, constantly changing its composition, can seldom consist of the same elements for any considerable portion of time, will probably appear rash and invidious. A long familiarity with the subject which I have in hand, has, however, convinced me, that if there be any truth in the general observation, that men who act under certain laws and interests, in collective bodies, are swayed by a peculiar influence, which, without borrowing a foreign phrase, might be called Corporation Spirit; the church of Rome presents the strongest and most marked instance of that moral phenomenon. Its great antiquity, and the gigantic power which it has enjoyed for ages, are the natural and intelligible causes of those fixed views and purposes which, existing at all times in the mass of its living members, must