writer is evidently alarmed at the thought of his old foe appearing in his own and entire strength *. The general plan of this writer has been adopted with great success by Courayer; and no advantage would be derived from the present manuscript, except it might be in the larger extent of the citations from the Cardinal.

The next and final work is Declarationes Concilii Tridentini, in eight large volumes, being the Declarations of

* But the letter possesses sufficient interest as well as curiosity to be given entire in the original. It is directed Al Molt' Illre. Sigre. Gio. Batta Rinalducci. The letter is as follows:

Molt' Ille. Sigre.

Quando l' altr' ieri rimandai à VS. que' fogli della sua traduzion francese commisi unitamte. al mio Palafreniere che la pregasse di voler esser meco al Giardino, disegnando io di ragionar con lei sopra la sua opera contra 'l Soave. Ma il Palafreniere non la trovò, e ben che lasciasse l' Ambasciata non le sarà stata poi fatta. Onde per non indugiar piu lungamte. à dirnele il mio giudicio secondo la sua intanza, debbo significarle, come per quella poca particella ch' io n' ho veduta, mi par lavoro pieno di molto discorse di molta erudizione, e che quivi tutto il mio componimto. sia come un fiume ch'entra nel mare, e che vi perderebbe il nome s'ella non gliel' havesse cosi onorevolmte. serbato. Ne questo suo libro potrebbe uscir da Intellecto che mon fosse molto capace degli affari del Mondo. Due difficoltà vi scorgo; la prima intorno ad ottener la publicazne. peròche essendo piu distesamte. rapportato tutto il Testo del Soave, il concederne l' impressione sarebbe lo stesso, che levare al Soave la proibizione. E benche il veleno sia piu corretto con l'antidoto; non mancherebbono tuttavia palati stravaganti, che vorrebbono mangiarlo senza l' antidoto, ò che per difetto del loro stomaco non riceverebbono da questo la conveniente preservazione. E cosi veggiamo che à niun controvertista è permesso di stampare al lato della sua opera quelle di Calvino, di Lutero, e simiglianti. La seconda difficoltà risguarda la sodisfazione comune: imperòche havendo ella voluto esaminar abbondantemte. ogni sillaba del Soave; chiunque non è passionato nella causa riceve sazietà da queste minuzzerie: e per tal ragione le Apologie, e le Contrapologie, quando son lunghe di mole, soglion' esser brevi di vita: mancando assai presto quel fervor di curiosità, che ad un certo modo, appassiona tutti nella contesa: Onde poi non si curano gli huomini di spender lunga lezione in contrasti per lo più tenui ed appartenenti più tosto alla riprensione dell' Avversario in qualch' errore di sua penna, che allo scoprimento di qualche verità rilevante. Cio mi occorre di rappresentare à VS. con quella ingenuità che à mè è naturale con tutti, ed à lei è gradita in tutti. E per fine mi le offero di tutto cuore. Di Casa il di 19. d' Aple. 1665.

Al Servizio di VS. affet

the Congregation instituted for the Interpretation of the canons and decrees of the Council of Trent. Selections have been published from this work; as may be seen in the edition of the canons and decrees by Gallemart, in the Admonitio Lectori: he has transcribed a considerable portion in his edition. The whole, however, has been lately printed in Rome by Zamboni. In my MS the course of the sessions is gone over, three, or perhaps four, times; and the latest date, for they are not in perfect chronological order, appears to be 1658 *.

In the present work, although it is my intention mainly to give the information, which is supplied by the new and generally inaccessible documents above specified, I shall not consider myself as strictly confined to them, but shall freely make use of such materials, already in possession of the public, as may be necessary to continuity in the narration, or which, for any justifiable reason, may be supposed acceptable to the reader.

The Council of Trent occupies a page in the annals of the world of high importance in many respects. As a simple exhibition of human character, particularly as assuming a corporate form for the time, it is interesting and instructive to the philosopher. But in its reference to religion, or Christianity, which is its appropriate aspect; in its reference further to the two great divisions, into which Christendom was severed by the progressive, overwhelming, and intolerable corruption of the dominant portion, a corruption which, if any even human virtue remained on the earth, rendered separation an imperative duty and unavoidable,

* See Historical Memoirs, &c. by C. Butler, Esq. i, 483, and following pages, where the author gives a French gentleman's account of the Vatican MSS of the Council, from inspection of them when in Paris. The account is very unsatisfactory; and the secretary's name, Massarelli, is constantly misspelt Massaret.

b

its interest and instruction receive a tenfold increase. Various efforts were made by individuals, and portions of society, to disengage themselves from the prevailing iniquity : but the most definite and decisive were those, which were put forth, when that iniquity had arrived at its full strength and confidence, in the event, which is emphatically called The Reformation. The irresistible progress of this holy resistance, as in the main it was, to the empire of heresy and crime, obliged the secular powers, for their own secular tranquillity, to endeavour to obtain a settlement of the troubles of which this secession was the occasion. For as no tyrant sits down patiently under the abstraction of his illgotten power, so the withdrawal of submission and contribution from the spiritual despot of Rome, however quietly performed, aroused all the feelings of revenge and persecution, in himself and his ministers; and by aggressions commenced on the part of those ministers, the public peace was sorely violated. The secular princes, finding themselves unable to compose a storm, which greatly annoyed them, and conscious that it was not perfectly their own province, looked to the spirituality, and particularly to a solemn assembly of its knowledge and virtue, in other words a general council of the church. This was a very natural feeling, and the best measure which could be adopted. And in defiance of general opinion, and of general ridicule, I feel no hesitation to say, that if Christian councils, whether great or small, were composed of members of average sanctity and information, in a state of the church not eminently forsaken by the Holy Spirit, much good and satisfaction might be the result of their ultimate decisions. Such a council, if in any real sense free, and controlled, or guided by men of the description just given, might, in answer to sincere and earnest prayer, have reason to believe, and the world

likewise, that what it decreed was the will of the Divine Spirit. But probably the disease had arrived at such a point of malignity, as to be past the season of natural remedy, or in just judgment denied the benefit of it. In the council actually, and at last, convened, not, there is too much reason to believe, for the establishment, but for the subversion, of truth, there was so much obstinate adherence to error, so much horror of all that could convict or rectify it, so much secularity and love of vice, and so much of consequent imposition and intrigue, that if ever a body of men were collected, whom the Holy Spirit could not meet and own, it was the Council of Trent. This assembly, therefore, as to the ends, for which it was professedly called, was a perfect nullity. It was a nullity, however, as an idol is a nullity, yet imposing upon the worshipper the guilt of idolatry. The positive mischief which it was calculated to produce would have been extreme, had it not, like some other noxious agents, conveyed somewhat of an antidote by the same channel which discharged the poison. That antidote was the disgrace which it procured for the rulers of the system, which it strove to uphold, and which sufficiently deterred every conscientious individual, who escaped its pale, from again being inveigled into it. A nullity, indeed, it was as to its direct and professed object: but its tendenIcies were of the most baneful description. It was, indeed, received with difficulty and qualification, even by those nations which acknowledge the Roman sovereignty: but the exceptions were not to the doctrine conciliarly defined, or as presumed to be the doctrine of the Roman, then called the catholic, church, on distinct and anterior authority. The doctrine, therefore, newly established at Trent, was the doctrine of the whole church continuing in communion with the Roman. No consistent member of that church

could refuse to bow with supreme reverence to a congregation of the rulers of his church, regularly assembled from all parts of the Roman world, with the chief ruler at its head, presiding by his authorised proxies, cardinal legates, claiming the miraculous guidance of the Holy Spirit, and in the plenitude of that authority, publishing its canons and decrees to the subjects of papal Rome.

The main compensating advantage to the friends of truth and religion from the Council of Trent is this. Had it not been for this authoritative and universally diffused announcement of the doctrine of the Roman church, it would have been a matter of some difficulty to discover, what the doctrine really was, by which either she would chuse, or might be compelled, to abide. For, amidst the chaos of varying, conflicting, and unsettled dogmas in Rome, up to the time of this her last general Council, while the circumstance afforded the advantage of optional selection, it enabled the defenders of the fortress to flee in succession from every post which they could not maintain, and betake themselves to some other, which would, at least, give employment to their assailant, until they were again in the same predicament. And it would be hard if the baffled assailant were not at last wearied out by such reception. But the canons and decrees of Trent, with the riveting creed and oath, which issued from the authority of the Council, and both expressed, and was sanctioned by its enactments, have at length fortunately bound the Proteus, and fixed him to a figure which he can no longer change. We cannot indeed altogether subscribe to the position, that the Council of Trent erected, what were formerly only questions of the schools, into dogmas of faith*. Rome had certainly

* Courayer, with whom probably this sentiment originated, speaks only of the greater part of these opinions. Pref. p. xxiv.