Part 16

So expert and versed in moral and political jugglery are Popes, bishops, and priests, that they must be closely watched, otherwise their artful practices will deceive the most intelligent spectators; unless there may be amongst them, perchance, some individual who has been trained himself to a knowledge of their arts. A Popish juggler cannot deceive me. I understand the whole of his operations, as well as he does himself. He may astonish the natives by his "wonderful feats," but with all his legerdemain he cannot deceive me in any of his movements.

Under these circumstances, I felt it my duty to raise the curtain behind which I knew were concealed those secret springs by which the machinery of Popery is moved in these United States. The most complicated part of the whole machine,--and the part most difficult to be understood,--is that which is called _Auricular Confession_. His Royal Holiness of Rome has obtained a patent, or something like it, for this particular wheel within a wheel of the machine. In almost all Catholic countries, no one dare examine or take a model from it. If he does, he incurs the penalty of being cursed by the Pope. An awful excommunication is immediately issued against him. Every thing the Pope does is awful If he gives his blessing, it is awful; his curse is awful; his person is awful; he cannot be approached unless with profound reverence. His big toe is awful; no one can kiss it, unless on bended knees, and after the performance of sundry puerilities, as Bishop Eastburn, of Boston, very properly calls all such fooleries.

It does not appear as yet, that his Holiness has taken out any patent for _Auricular Confession_ in this country; and as I know not how soon he may gull American heretics to grant him one, I have taken the liberty of exhibiting a model of it, for public inspection. There are parts of this model which may appear revolting to the delicate sensibilities of my readers; but let them reflect that the original is formed and put together by the sacred hands of His Holiness the Pope and his pious priests. I act only in the capacity of an artist, or a sculptor, who is permitted, event by the rules of good taste and delicacy, to give likenesses, in painting and statuary, of the most deformed and unsightly objects. They are only required to be true and faithful to nature and the originals from which the likenesses are taken. I have done no more than this, in the model or picture which I have drawn of Auricular Confession; and those who do not choose to examine it, are, of course, at perfect liberty to pass it by unnoticed. The day is not far distant when it will be found in every family in the United States.

I have the honor to remain the public's humble servant,

WILLIAM HOGAN.

AURICULAR CONFESSION AND POPISH NUNNERIES.

It has been observed by an eminent writer, that "book-making is something like pouring water from one vessel into another, and then pouring it back again." There is much truth in the observation; this is obvious to every general reader. There is scarcely a work issued from the press, which is not substantially a copy of something that has been written before upon the same subject The old water-casks, which have been as it were fixtures for centuries, are now being dug out of their places, and the waters contained in them are changed into new casks, having a more sightly appearance, and a more polished exterior. This, however, is more apt to be the case in the writings of theologians, than in those of any other body of men. Limited as my own reading has been, I do not recollect ever having perused a volume upon theology, especially from the pen of an American theologian, which I had not seen or read (at least in part) before. How to account for this I know not. Assuredly this land of freedom has among its theologians and controversialists men of the finest minds--minds like their own rivers, overflowing with the deepest, the clearest, most limpid and purest streams of thought--minds in which the ever-rolling ocean of time has had, as yet, scarcely an opportunity of depositing much of its accumulated impurities--minds which, if their great powers were evolved and brought to bear on the moral and civil condition of our fellow citizens, would give us a new era or a new world of thought and morals--strong, permanent, diffusive, progressive--and as different from those of olden times, as our new and beautiful republic is from some of the aged, faded, sickly and consumptive governments of former days.

It is difficult; I own, to form a new system of any kind, especially a new system of thought or morals; but still such a thing is not impossible. There never was, and never will be, a system constructed without having to encounter great and almost insuperable obstacles; first, in its formation, and secondly, in its application and various bearings.

It was difficult, for instance, to form our own system of civil government. Its very conception was for some time looked upon as a wild theory. Such a thing was not dreamed of in any work upon political ethics taught in our seminaries or schools, in the days of its founders, yet the system was established, and has hitherto fully answered all the expectations of its friends; but even if our comparatively new form or system of government did not entirely succeed--if it even failed and tumbled to atoms, that would not be a sufficient argument against making the experiment, for even in its ruins, fragments may be found which may be useful to posterity. Yes, as the poet beautifully expresses it,

"You may break--you may ruin the vase, if you will, But the scent of the roses will hang round it still."

The failure of any system, as I have observed, is not a sufficient argument against its practicability, or its ultimate usefulness; and hence it appears to me strange that American minds, so fertile in all expedients to advance the temporal interests of man, should be so barren and unproductive of any system of thought or morals exclusively their own, and entirely independent of the corrupt and vitiated systems which have bewildered Europe and its moral philosophers for so many centuries. It is passing strange that the theologians and professors of moral theology in this New World of ours--if they can do no better--do not unite upon some plan to exclude from among them institutions which all admit to be calculated to demoralize the rising generation.

I am happy to find that there is now a system of thought and morals, or something like it, to be found amongst us, which is peculiarly American; it is denominated or called the _Christian League_. Let me be understood, when I use the term system. By system I mean an arrangement of objects or purposes so as to make them agree and unite. The Christian League I believe may be called a system; its members are united in the accomplishment of given objects. But if not strictly speaking a system itself, it has within it materials out of which a noble one of thought and morals can be formed. It is yet in its chrysalis, but the sun of righteousness, which I trust the dark clouds of superstition that now portentously hang over us shall never be permitted to hide from our view, will soon warm it into maturity, and give it wings to fly and carry with it wherever it goeth, glad tidings of salvation. I do not agree with the leading members of the Christian League, in their modus operandi. I have taken the liberty of suggesting to them a different course of action from that which they have been pleased to adopt; but I am with them, heart and soul. I shall support their measures, as far as I find them calculated to check the progress of Popery in the United States. If I cannot agree with them in their plan to effect this, I shall only say--and I say it with the utmost respect to each and every member of the Christian League!!!!!

"If a better system thine, Impart it frankly, or make use of mine."

I have suggested to the members of the Christian League, to throw away from amongst them all appearance of sectarianism; but I know not that they have done so; the name or the society would indicate that they had; but do facts warrant such an inference? The very reverse is the case. Their prominent speakers all belong to one denomination; there may be a few exceptions, but there are not many; the public presses which advocate the proceedings of the League, are generally supported by those of a particular creed. What is the inference? It is this: either other presses and other denominations of Christians are indifferent about the success of the League, or the members of the League are unwilling to hold any communion with them. The former cannot be the case; the latter must be, of course. This is not right, and if persevered in, must ultimately neutralize all the measures of an association which, if properly conducted, might evolve and mature one of the finest systems of thought and moral government that has ever been discovered. I have suggested to the members of the Christian League, that they should have but one base, or one great moral trunk. I have advised them to partition this trunk; and divide it into branches, to be spread equally among all the followers of the law of God, and all the friends of civil rights. Then let every man do his duty; let no man fancy that because of his elevation in the Church, or higher salary, his nature has been metamorphosed, or refined by any chemical process; let him not suppose himself sublimated by the sunshine of personal popularity, which is fleeting as the wind; let each individual suppose--and history, as well as my own personal experience, enables me to assure him that he may do so without injustice--that the cause of morals and civil rights has one common enemy in the United States, which must be not only defeated, but annihilated--yes, annihilated. While that enemy lives, the cause of morality cannot flourish, and the civil rights of man are in danger. Need I tell the reader who or what that enemy is? It is Popery. A healthy state of morals, and Popery cannot exist in any country, any kingdom, or any clime; the air which gives vitality to Popery, and sustains its existence, is death to morality--aye, that very morality which, as Americans, we boast of, and consider to be the very incarnation even of our civil rights. It is true, that under the guidance of reason, several forms of government have been established, but all have been imperfect and unsatisfactory to man in the various stages and mutations of the social system. If we look back and examine the history, the nature and character of those improvements which have been made in society ever since its genesis, we shall find that the finger of religion, ever true to its purpose, invariably pointed and invited the attention of man to them; we shall find also that whenever or wherever this has not been the case, the people have not prospered; we find in every thing truly valuable to man, whether in his social or individual capacity, the hand of religion, and the almost omnipotency of moral principle. This is eminently conspicuous at the present day, and perhaps as much so in this as any country in the world, and hence it is that we should be peculiarly grateful and vigilant in removing from among us any and every cause which may directly or indirectly have a tendency to injure the morals of our people; for amid the ruin of our morals shall surely be found the elements of our national downfall.

I have alluded to this subject heretofore, in my books on Popery. I did not expect that all would approve of those books. I was aware that many, even among Protestants, would find fault with several of the expressions used in the small volume which I have recently written, entitled _Auricular Confession_ to which these pages are a sequel. That Papists should find fault with all that I have written, does not at all surprise me; but that Protestants should find any--though I am happy to find that very few have found any--is a matter of some surprise to me. It must be owing to the fact that they know not and understand not what auricular confession is, or how it is made. That Americans in general should know nothing upon this subject, and be horrified at the bare relation of its iniquitous details, is a fact which can be easily understood and explained. They have never made auricular confession the subject of their study, and hence the horror they feel at its iniquitous and private abominations. I must frankly confess, however, that it is a matter of surprise that American theologians should be so entirely unacquainted with the writings of popish doctors and popish priests, as not to find all the apparently objectionable expressions in my books in common use among them. There is not to be found a single volume among the writers of the Popish Church, on the subject of auricular confession, in which my statements are not corroborated, and that in language far more objectionable than mine--language so gross and indelicate that I could not in justice to public taste and delicacy introduce it into my books. Those who have read my book on auricular confession, may recollect the questions which I have accused Popish bishops and priests of putting to their young female penitents, and which some liberal Protestants say could not have been the case. I now assert, without any qualification whatever, and without any mental reservation or equivocation, that there is not in the United States a priest nor bishop, who has heard the confessions of married or single women, without asking them such questions as I have given in my book. I ask Bishop Fenwick of this city, or any other Roman Catholic priest or bishop living, to contradict me if he can. I challenge those females, young or old, who have ever been in the habit of confessing their sins to priests, to come forward and say, We have been at confession, and such questions as those contained in Hogan's book have never been put to us.

The charges I have made against Romish priests are of a serious character. If false they can be refuted. I am alone; there are nearly three millions of Roman Catholics in the United States, and if there is among this vast multitude, an individual who can say and give such evidence of the truth of his statement, as will satisfy any Court of Equity, that I have done injustice to popes, priests or bishops, in charging them with tampering with their female penitents in the confessional, in order the more easily to debauch them, I will publicly acknowledge that I am guilty of slander, and have wronged them. I trust that after this, Protestant theologians will take more pains in reading the works of Popish moralists, with which, as far as I have the honor of their acquaintance, they are lamentably unacquainted. I saw a strong instance of this the other evening. I chanced to meet at the house of a mutual friend, with one of the most learned and pious theologians of the Presbyterian Church in this or any other country in the world. He very courteously observed that he did not question my veracity, but that it appeared incredible to him that Popish priests or bishops, would put such questions to married or single women while confessing to them as I have accused them of. I listened in silent wonder to this great and good man; for the moment I knew not what to say.

Here was a venerable American theologian--himself a living, moving theological library--the embodiment of American Protestant theology, doubting, or at least hesitating to credit the fact, that Romish bishops and priests put to their female penitents the gross, licentious, libidinous questions contained in my book on confession. The past, the present and the future, seemed to rise and rush before me in imagination, and I could not help exclaiming in my own mind, woe be to this land of my adoption, woe be to its generous and hospitable people, if even its patriarchs and wise men, such as he who now stands before me, and whose life has been a beautiful comment upon the purity and simplicity of the Christian religion, cannot fully understand, even at this late period, the corruptions which the drag nets of Popery are bringing amongst us and strewing on the paths of our hitherto virtuous mothers and chaste daughters.

It is impossible to find a work on confession written by a Popish priest in full communion with his church, which does not contain almost the very language I have used. I finally satisfied my learned friend that I was correct in all my statements; I explained to him the position of a Romish priest in the confessional, and that of a young lady confessing to him, and never shall I forget the remarks of the venerable gentleman on that occasion. "If," said he, "my wife or daughter were dressed in the finest silk, and then put into a hogshead of mud and rolled down a hill, I should as soon expect to find their dresses without a stain, as find their minds and morals pure and chaste, after going any length of time to confession to a Romish priest." And he was right; the principles of popery, as taught in Romish confessional, and those of purity, are antagonist principles.

We are supposed to have about thirty-six millions of papists--as I have heretofore stated--in the world. Look, American Protestants, at the condition of these your brethren, and tremble lest their present condition be yours at some future period; look over the world, boundless almost as it is, and great, and glorious, and moral as its inhabitants might be; what is it now, when it seems to be undergoing, as it were, a process of self regeneration,--when its hitherto hidden treasures, almost impatient of restraint, seem to leap and bound into existence, to offer themselves to the uses and purposes of man, at the mere bid and beck of science? What is the condition of man in this glorious world or ours, under the influence of popery? The largest, the widest, and most fertile portion of the globe is under Popish influence; the soil of these countries which Papists inhabit is rich, their fields are fair, and their valleys beautiful; all the products of nature thrive in them; the sun of heaven shines over them in all its luminous magnificence; every thing seems to be sent from heaven, for man's use; every thing seems to aspire to heaven and to be happy. Man alone decays in these Popish countries; man alone is unhappy; the longings and heavenward aspirations of his immortal soul are checked, and he withers and degenerates into a being less happy than the beast of the field, and far more degraded, because acquired and superinduced inferiority, is much more degrading than that which is native and original The moral degeneracy which we see in those countries where Popery, with its confessions, extreme unctions, and other debasing fooleries, prevail, is not to be attributed to any decay in the natural vigor of the human mind. We have no reason to suppose that the mind was created in a less vigorous state in countries where Popery prevails, than in others where it does not I have frequently conversed with anatomists of distinguished eminence, who have visited all the countries inhabited by Catholics, as well as those inhabited by Protestants, and I have learned from all that there is no difference in the anatomical construction of their hearts and brains; still, it is evident to all, at least to every man of science and observation, that there is a difference in the mental faculties of those who are born and live under Popish domination, and those who are born and live under a free government of civil rights. Let us, for instance, take a Papist fresh from Italy, Spain, Mexico, or even Ireland; place him in the same condition with a free-born American Protestant, and see the difference between them; the latter is active, quick, intelligent, full of thought, full of life and enterprise; the former in nine cases out of ten, is inactive, of sluggish mind, and rarely aspires to excellence in any thing really useful. See, for instance, a Papist when he lands upon our shores; so tame and so accustomed to Popish tyranny has he been, that he crouches beneath the nod or frown of a priest the moment he sees him. Fear, of course, must become the predominant passion of all people and countries where Popery prevails, and yet, unaccountable as it may appear, this new world of ours is not only admitting but inviting Popery and its adherents into it, and offers them the rights of freemen, with a full knowledge of the fact that they are the subjects of a foreign king,--the Pope of Rome. Popery--that sink of the universe, as an elegant writer, who is himself a Roman Catholic, expresses it,--is invited into the United States, and its votaries cherished by a free, generous, but unsuspecting people. I have often conversed with American Protestants of distinction upon this subject, and regret finding that many of them--especially those of the Unitarian creed--are strong advocates of Popery, and in favor of its introduction among our people. Their arguments are plausible, and no doubt appear to the superficial reader worthy of all consideration. Whatever, say Unitarians, or liberal Christians, have been the vices, profligacies, or ambition, of Popes and Papists in former ages, they should be overlooked, in consideration of the great and grand objects which they had in view, and the vast and mighty interests which were then at stake. Religion--the Christian religion--say the liberals of the present day, was then in its infancy, without any other protection save that which its own god-like purity threw around it; it was committed to the care of early fathers or papas--from which the word Pope takes its origin--of the church; the struggle between them and the priests of Paganism was fierce; it was terrible; and well did the former do their duty--nobly and faithfully did they struggle for the ascendancy of Christianity, and its establishment among the nations of the north. To do this effectually, and to establish a hierarchy exclusively their own, independent of any other, was indispensable. To effect this, was one of the most momentous and grandest projects that ever entered the mind of man at that early period of society. We all know from history, the difficulties which the early Papas or Popes--not of the Romish church, but of the Christian church--had to encounter, in their contest with Paganism. We also know--and no man who believes in the Christian religion doubts it--that great credit is due to them, for what they have done against the Turks. They have left on record many evidences of their ardent zeal, sincere piety, and deep humility. But does it follow, that because the fathers of the Christian church have done so much for Christianity, by being the depositories of its principles, and active defenders of its faith---does it follow, I say, that Romish Popes or Romish Papas, are equally entitled to our respect, support, and confidence?

Do these liberal Christians know that there is as wide a difference between the Papas of the early Christian church, and those of the modern Romish church, as there is between the notorious Himes, of the Millerite church, and the learned Dr. Gannett, of the Unitarian society? Is it sound logic to infer that because the fathers of the Christian church were good men, and should be welcomed wherever they went, that the present fathers of the Romish Church are also good men and must be received into this country, with their interminable retinue of monks, nuns, friars, and other mock reverend and semi-reverend male and female vagabonds, who precede and follow them?

Liberal Christians will pardon me when I say, that nothing but a total unacquaintance with history, with man's nature, with man's rights, and unacquaintance with all that tends to promote human happiness, and to elevate man in the scale of creation, could force them to such a conclusion.