St. Jerome, that, even in his time, bishops, with the exception of holy orders, shared with the inferior clergy the administration of all the rites of religion. In the primitive Church, Confirmation immediately followed Baptism, to which it was considered a sort of supplement. It is removed to a distance from Baptism, perhaps not without For it would not comport well with the dignity of a bishop to be the ordinary minister of a mere supplemental rite. But these changes are accidental or unimportant. Be it so.' pp. 82, 83, 88.

cause.

They are not the less significant. So then, there must be a bishop for the sake of the rite, and there must be the rite for the sake of the bishop! But here, Mr. O'Croly talks almost like a Presbyterian. Again, speaking of discrepancies, he remarks, that in the Eastern Church, the form of absolution is deprecatory; in the Western, it is absolute. The Greek priest beseeches the Almighty to grant pardon to the penitent sinner, 'whereas the Latin priest boldly grants pardon in his own name." In the Church of England, we have the Greek form in the daily service, the Latin form in the office for the Visitation of the Sick! Sacerdotal absolution is the doctrine of both the Roman and the Anglican Church: the difference between them relates to the conditions. Matrimony has undergone various changes since the primitive times; and it is only since the Council of Trent that the presence of a priest has been deemed indispensable to the validity of the contract. The Church of England, though it does not call marriage a sacrament, has recently shewn a strong disposition to stickle for its being a church ordinance.

Transubstantiation and the Mass are the subjects of the next two sections. Upon the former point, Mr. O'Croly is far more of a Protestant than Alexander Knox; nay, we do not know what our High-church divines will say to the following statements.

< The truth is, that the Lord's Supper, as to its contents, is a matter of observance rather than belief. It is a Christian institution, a monument of perpetual standing, the continued and universal celebration of which is to remind Christian believers of the Victim slain on Mount Calvary, by the symbols of his body and blood, expressed in the consecrated elements, and given to the faithful. In this light was it considered by the Apostles and primitive Christians. In process of time it grew into the shape of a dogma, gradually swelled its consequence in the ranks of speculative tenets, until at length, in the revolution of times and principles, it was placed in the foreground of religion, and made the great standard of orthodoxy.' pp. 102, 103.

Upon the subject of the Mass, Mr. O'Croly expresses himself without reserve as a Protestant, although he would fain resolve the controversy on this point into a mere logomachy. He avows, that the Lord's Supper cannot be with propriety termed a sacrifice; that the same rite cannot be at once a sacrifice and a sacrament; and he remarks that the Author of the Epistle

comprehension failed.

'On the other hand,' continues the learned Bishop, the Whigs, seeing the leaders of the Tories drive on ill designs so visibly, and that they are 'followed in this by the body of the Tories, who promote 'their elections, and adhere to them in all divisions in the two 'Houses of Parliament, and are united in one party with them; 'from thence conclude that they are all equally concerned, and ' alike guilty, and thus they are jealous of them all.' It appears that there were conformers among the Tories of that time, as there are sham reformers among the present race; men who, Burnet says, seem resolved to swallow down every thing, in order to 'the throwing up all at once, if they should come to have a clear majority in parliament, and durst lay aside the mask.' The policy of this party was, to raise the heat against the Dissenters, and to give that body of men a jealousy of the Government ;' while, abroad, their intrigues had for their object, to 'disgrace the 'king's faithfullest ministers.' Many of the Tories, however, the Bishop remarks, 'have not those views and designs that, perhaps, some of their leaders may be justly charged with.'

6

Our readers will, we apprehend, be struck with the appositeness of this description, as equally applicable to the state and character of the two great political parties at the present moment. The circumstances of the times are, indeed, materially altered; but the royal motto of the last of the Stuarts is still that of the Church and State party*. Happily, there is now no Pretender :-yet, the Orange party would fain provide themselves with a Royal Candidate for the succession. Our security against the horrors of a civil contest lies, not in the altered character of the faction which at present glories in the pious Duke of Cumberland as its head, and which burns to shew its Protestant zeal by victories similar to that of Rathcormac, but in the more enlightened state of the public mind, and the relative weakness of the extreme Tory party.

Then, as now, the danger to which the Protestant religion was exposed, proceeded from the High Church party. 'No Popery' always has meant, what it still means, in the mouth of a Churchman, no dissent; and it is a war-cry raised against the Catholics, as being politically Dissenters. With the Roman Catholic Church, as such, her own ascendancy being secured, the Church of England has no quarrel. With the sister churches of the Reformation, the Church of England has no communion. So long as the Irish Papists paid their tithes, the increase of Popery in Ireland cost the heads of the Anglican hierarchy no concern. And even now, to secure in all the integrity of its abuses,' the Church property, which is the Irish Church, the Tory party would very

*

6

Semper Eadem; facetiously translated, worse and worse.

generally consent to take the Romish priests into the pay of the State, agreeably to the plan recommended by Pitt and Londonderry; thereby giving the direct sanction of the Legislature to the ministers of an idolatrous creed, as, in India, it has been yielded to the worship of Juggernaut. Such a measure has been boldly advocated by the Times, the organ of the most powerful section of the Conservatives; and it is so perfectly in accordance with the Establishment principle, that its adoption, were a Tory administration to accede to power, might be looked for, unless a firm resistance were opposed to the specious but nefarious scheme.

That the reign of Popery will ever be restored in Protestant England, we have no serious apprehension. Yet, we do not think that no danger can accrue from its insidious increase. We cannot shut our eyes to the numerous secessions from Protestantism which have recently taken place, principally among the higher orders, to the engaging and fascinating form that English Catholicism assumes, and to the sort of re-action in favour of the proscribed creed, which has been produced by the political crusade against it. But we are anxious to impress it upon the minds of our readers, that the danger to religion arises mainly from the secret affinity of High-church principles to Romanism. The Tory journals boast that the English Catholic gentry are Conservatives, the allies of the Established Protestantism against Irish Popery and English Dissent. There are noble exceptions, but, generally speaking, this is the fact. Popery is the religion of Conservatism. Its antiquity, its pretended universality, its pomp and splendour, and its hierarchy, combine to recommend it to the upper ranks. Toryism, on the other hand, is as naturally the political creed of the Papist, when not placed by circumstances in opposition to the Government. The Protestantism of the higher classes forms a very slender partition between them and the Catholics of their own order and party; and this fence is continually being broken in upon by intermarriages. Intercourse with foreign Catholics tends still further to undermine an exclusive attachment to the Protestant faith. That, under these circumstances, Popery should gain strength, and that a mutual assimilation should take place between the professors of the different creeds, is not surprising; and it might be anticipated that Protestantism would suffer most materially in its essential character from the process. Thus does the way seem to be preparing for an ecclesiastical coalition between the two Churches; by which means alone Popery can ever be re-instated, under another name, in the sees and stalls which it longs to re-occupy as its native and appropriate seats. In this view, the Inquiry into the points of difference between the Churches becomes one of ominous interest.

'I am sometimes,' says the venerable William Jay, in an elo

6

to the Hebrews expressly says, that Christ Jesus, our High Priest, offered himself but once.'

He speaks of the full, adequate, comprehensive efficacy of this sacrifice to the exclusion of every other. If the celebration of the Eucharist was the great sacrifice of the new law, to be offered as such every where and at all times, from the rising to the setting sun, is it not passing strange that it was not noticed by him, more especially as he was writing expressly on the subject of sacrifices? This argument, though a negative, is, from circumstances, equivalent to a positive, and cannot easily be got over.' pp. 105, 106.

We have never seen the absurdity of the doctrine of Transubstantiation so well illustrated as in the following paragraph.

According to Aristotle and the schoolmen, body or matter consists of two properties—namely, substance and accidents, or accidental qualities. These qualities fall under the cognizance of the senses, and are called accidental, because, though generally essential to matter, they are not so specifically or individually. For example, wax may be soft or hard, may be moulded into this shape or that, may put on new forms and appearances, without ceasing, however, through all these changes, to be wax. No particular form is essential to it, though it must, of necessity, appear under some form or other. So much for accidental qualities. We come now to substance, which is defined to be an essential attribute of matter, and the substratum or subject, in which the accidental qualities inhere. This essential attribute or property of matter does not fall under the cognizance of the senses, is invisible and impalpable, and only to be apprehended by the imagination. In short, though it is called an essential property of matter, it has nothing material in it, and should either be considered spiritual, which would be absurd, or a complete non-entity; so that the individual material substance or body is composed of all that, and of nothing else but that, which falls under the cognizance of the senses. Substance, therefore, in matter or body, as contra-distinguished from accidental qualities, according to Aristotle and the schoolmen, is no reality, but a mere figment of the imagination. Let us apply this reasoning to the question in hand. The change effected by the words of consecration does not, it is granted, affect the sensible or accidental qualities-the taste, the colour, the strength, the appearances. No alteration or metamorphosis takes place in this respect. The bread retains its nourishing, the wine its inebriating quality. This is granted; this must be granted. Even Thomas of Aquin says, that the senses are not deceived, because they pronounce judgement only on the accidental qualities, which of right fall under their cognizance. On what, therefore, does the power of transformation exert itself? On the imaginary attribute substance, which, contrary to the definition given of a noun substantive, can neither be seen, nor felt, nor heard, nor understood. What then shall we say of the doctrine of Transubstantiation, but that, resting as it does upon an airy nothing, it must, "like the baseless fabric of a yision, disappear, and leave not a wreck behind?" Transubstantiation, then, may be defined, a transmutation of nothing; and we can arrive

at no other conclusion but that all the churches of Christendom have been turned topsy-turvy on the subject, by absurd metaphysics and imaginary metamorphosis.

Further, it is admitted, that the change or metamorphosis, real or imaginary, as the case may be, wrought by the all-powerful words of consecration, is but of a transitory nature. For when the elements begin to corrupt or suffer decomposition, the substance, which was supposed to have undergone the transformation, returns to its old state or relation, while the body of Christ withdraws from the decaying elements, or by the regular process of nature is re-transformed into the substance of the bread. Here is transmutation upon transmutation; or, more properly speaking, one absurdity generated by another.

Many Roman Catholic theologians are not afraid to advance opinions on this subject, that do not exactly tally with the definition given by the Council of Trent. They maintain that there is no conversion of one substance into another; but that one is annihilated, and the other instantaneously substituted. Whether they believe a similar vice versa process takes place on the decay of the elements, does not appear. But to be consistent, they should believe so; and that Christ's body is annihilated to make room for the reproduction of the bread. If this be not a reductio ad absurdum, there is nothing of the kind in Euclid.' pp. 99-102.

But while the doctrine of Transubstantiation has served as a fertile point of dispute between Roman Catholic and Protestant divines, and has even been selected as a turning-point by which to test the faith of the members of each communion, the fact is, that the Lutherans, and some of our High-Churchmen, closely approximate to the notions of the more enlightened Romanists upon this point. But the doctrine of the Mass, as taught by the friars, and received by the vulgar, is as distinct from the scholastic doctrine of Transubstantiation as magic is from metaphysics. The practice of saying masses as a charm for all sorts of purposes, which prevails in Ireland, is sheer paganism; and we see no reason why it should not be ranked with witchcraft. No defence can be offered for the priests or friars who countenance the delusion; and it deserves consideration whether such cases of imposture do not fairly come within the sphere of penal legislation.

.

Masses,' says Mr. O'Croly, are offered for a variety of purposes, at least in the minds of the multitude-for brute beasts as well as for human beings. A farmer who happens to have his cattle disordered, the rot among his sheep, or the murrain among his cows, will have masses said for their recovery. The fishermen of Dungarvan, and elsewhere, regularly get masses said, that they may hook the more fish. It is quite common among the ignorant to be under the persuasion that worldly calamities result from the agency of evil spirits; which opinion, indeed, receives some countenance from the book of Job. To counteract this malignant influence, they fly to the priest to have masses said.

VOL. XV.-N.S.

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