Part 6

"Let then, earth, sea and sky Make war against me! On my heart I show Their mighty Master's seal. In vain they try To end my life, that can but end its woe. Is that a death-bed where a Christian dies? Yes! but not his--'t is death itself there dies."

But to return to the subject from which I have digressed, without even the formality of taking leave of my reader; married ladies, who are members of the Roman Catholic church, will bear with me a little longer, I cannot consent to leave them without farther warning; and should their husbands and myself ever meet--which probably cannot be, till we meet in heaven--they will thank, in place of blaming me, for cautioning them against the seductive wiles and wicked intrigues of Romish confessors. It is probable the wearisome repetitions in my statements may give the reader a distaste to following them out, and accompanying me through them. It will, I fear, enfeeble the interest, which he might otherwise take in the result. Besides, a higher tone of thought, of literary taste, and intellectual feeling, would undoubtedly be much more pleasant to him. The nature of the subject will not admit of it, and I cannot help, in speaking upon a gross and indelicate subject, doing so in a language as unpalatable to my own taste, as to that of the reader. Besides, I am not master of any other words in the English vocabulary, better calculated to convey to those for whom this book is intended, the full meaning and purport of the statements which I make.

There is taught in the Romish church, and it prevails to an extent broad and long as the land we live in, a doctrine which I feel it my duty to explain to Americans, whether they are Protestants or converts to the church of Rome. When I say that it prevails over the extent of this country, I believe I should qualify the assertion, as I know not fully and exclusively of my own knowledge, that American converts to the Romish church are aware that such a doctrine exists; but I know that European Catholic women, especially the Irish, are taught it by their priests, and believe it as firmly as they do that their church is infallible. It is a doctrine frightful even to think upon. I know nothing, in ancient or modern times, in heathen, pagan, or Mahomedan creeds, of equal turpitude. It is calculated to overturn all laws, human and divine. It aims a fatal and deadly blow at the root of the whole social system. It snaps, it shatters, it tears into shreds, every cord that binds community to community, man to man, wife to husband, and child to parent. It is this. Married women, who have no children and never had any, are taught by Romish priests that, in case they have no children, the church has the power of giving them fecundity, and thus enabling them to "comply with the great object of their creation," viz., "to increase and multiply." The holy church, in her wisdom, or rather in her craft and deep knowledge of human nature, knows full well that married ladies, especially those who have property, are often unhappy because they have no children; and the priests, looking upon this as a fine opportunity not only to indulge their own passions but to make money, tell such women, in the confessional, that they have the power, specially delegated to them from Almighty God, of giving them those children for which they are so anxious. I well recollect an instance of this Romish infatuation--this worse than hellish belief. It proved a source of much trouble to myself in after life, and I believe I may partly trace to it the very origin of my difficulties with the Popish priests in this country.

While officiating as a Roman Catholic priest in---------, I became acquainted with a Roman Catholic lady and gentleman, of good character and considerable wealth. The husband stood well in society, and so did the wife, and I believe both deserved it. There was but one barrier, to all appearance, in the way of their happiness. They had no children; and having no blood or family alliances in the country, this seemed a source of distress to the wife, though I could not help remarking that they were an extremely fond couple. Not very long after my acquaintance with them, the wife called on me, told me her grievance in not having children, and asked me how much it would cost her to purchase from the church, her interference in the matter and the blessing of having children. I forgot my usual caution. Indignation took the place of policy; I forgot, for a moment, that I was bound to keep the secrets of the Pope and the infallible church, and to defend them both, right or wrong. I replied indignantly, "Madam, you are the dupe of priestcraft. There is no power in the church to countervail the will of God." The lady retired; and I cannot give the reader a better idea of the infatuation of Papist women, or the consummate villany of Romish priests in the confessional, than by relating what followed. She called upon me the day following, stated to me that since she saw me, she called on the reverend Mr.--------, a Franciscan friar, who lived only a few doors from me, and having told him what I said to her, he raised his hands in pious astonishment, and told her that he expected nothing better from me; that he suspected me of _heresy_ for some time past, and had now a proof of it, and that I should be cast out of the pale of the church, as fit society only for the devils; and accordingly in a few months after, this holy friar and the holy Romish bishop of the diocese, solemnly cursed me from the head to the toe-nails, casting me into _hell_ for such damnable heresies. I understand that the lady of whom I have spoken is now blessed with an interesting family of children, and the husband one of the happiest _fathers_ in the world. The friar is an exemplary and reverend servant of the _infallible_ church, still hearing confessions, while I am a wicked heretic, with no human chance of salvation. "_Sic transit gloria mundi_" Thus are the streams of domestic happiness and social life polluted in our very midst by Romish priests; and yet they are encouraged, they are fed, they are sustained, they are received into society by the very men whose wives and daughters they have ruined, and with whose happiness they have sported and gambled. I say sported, because I know of my own knowledge, that nothing affords the reverend young Yahoos of the Romish church, especially those who come from Europe, more pleasure in-their private conversation, than speaking of the _gullible Yankee heretics_, who fancy themselves a match for priests in the infallible church. Could Americans witness the carousals of these infidel and idolatrous priests at their expense, it would have a better effect upon them than all I can say or write; but as time atone can effect this, I must content myself with entreating my fellow-citizens to be upon their guard with Romish bishops and priests, or they will one day rue the consequences. Once more do I find myself far from the path in which I commenced these pages. I intimated to the reader, somewhere in the beginning of this book, that I intended to give my reasons for leaving the Romish church; but it would seem as if I had forgotten it; at any rate, I have as yet but little more than half fulfilled it. I have, however, the satisfaction to believe, that the few I have given, up to the time of my arrival in Philadelphia, are amply sufficient. Fresh proofs have there been given to me, that the Popish church was not infallible, and that I could not, consistently with a correct sense of duty, support her doctrines or countenance the practices of her priests; but, even there, notwithstanding all I had seen and witnessed, such were the prejudices of education, that I still tried to persuade myself that Popery was religion; though I tried to circulate the Scriptures, and believed in the necessity of so doing: during four years that I spent in the college of Maynooth, they formed no portion of the education of the students. It is my firm conviction, that out of the large number of students who received their education there for the ministry, there was not one who read the four gospels through, nor any portion of them, except such as were found in detached passages, in works of controversy between Catholics and Protestants. Until I went to college, I scarcely ever heard of a Bible. I know not of one in any parish in Munster, except it may be a Latin, one, which each priest may or may not have, as he pleased. But I studied closely the holy fathers of the church; so did most of the students. We were taught to rely upon them as our sole guide in morals, and the only correct interpreters of the Bible. A right of private judgment was entirely denied to us, and represented as the source of multifarious errors. The Bible, in fact, we had no veneration for. It was, in truth, but a dead letter in our college; it was a sealed book to us; though there was not an equal number of students who were obliged to study more closely the sayings, the sophistry, the metaphysics and mystic doctrines of those raving dreamers, called holy fathers, many of whom, if now living, would be deemed mad men and dealt with accordingly. I looked back again to those fathers for proofs of the infallibility of the Romish church, and for some evidence to satisfy me that I had no right to the exercise of my private judgment, either in reading or interpreting the Scriptures,--but I looked in vain. The fathers themselves were extremely obscure. I found them often inconsistent and at variance with each other upon many of the _fundamental_ articles, as they are termed, of the Popish creed. On a re-perusal of those fathers, I have found them often contradict each other. Nay, more; such frequently were the theological vagaries of these semi-deranged though well meaning men, that a careful reader will often find the same father contradicting himself. Chrysostom, whom the Papists worship as a saint, and Tertullian, another saint of theirs, flatly contradict themselves. Chrysostom says, in speaking of the _real presence_ in the eucharist that Christ gives himself bodily to be eaten, and that those who receive him, that is, the consecrated wafer, made of flour and water by a priest, may see him, touch him, and if they wish, fix _their teeth in his flesh_. In another place he says, that "the nature of the bread is not changed at all, though it is worthy to be called the Lord's body." Tertullian in one place maintains the same doctrine in relation to the _real presence_, but in another place, he tells us, "that the meaning of the Scripture phrase, _this is my body_, is, _this is the representation_ of my body." If these men were to live now,--if Jerome and Chrysostom and Tertullian were to utter such rhapsodical nonsense, what should we think of them or their followers? Yet the Romish church requires that the present generation shall forfeit all its advantages of education, science, and all the progressive advancement and expansion of intellect, and take the writings of those men as the only correct interpretation of the Word of God. It occurred to me, therefore, on a second perusal of these works, that I should reject them unconditionally. I knew full well, from my intimacy with the Romish church, that it was a maxim with the fathers, and expressly defended by them, as it is now by modern Papists, that "fraud was sometimes justifiable for a holy end, and that falsehoods were valuable auxiliaries to truth!" This doctrine is now avowed, or at least taught in the _confessional_, and in Catholic countries out of the confessional, as well as in every Popish college in the universe.

From these I turned to my neglected Bible, and in it I discovered no such maxims as were taught by the holy fathers, and are now inculcated by the priests. I have not found that any of the evangelists ever even intimated "that fraud was justifiable, or that it was ever lawful to do evil that good may come." Apart from all this, it appeared to me not at all unlikely that the inspired men who wrote the Scriptures, knew as well how to convey their own ideas to the world, as the holy fathers or the _infallible_ church did; nor could I see anything heterodox, in supposing that if there was anything unintelligible or obscure in their language, they would leave us some record or note of the fact. They wrote by command, and under the direct inspiration of God; they wrote to instruct and enlighten the world; and with all due deference to the infallible church, and her holy fathers, I think it is fairly to be presumed, that their writings are less obscure, and more entitled to universal credence, than the rhapsodies of fathers and monks, one half of whom were as crazy as so many Millerites. It occurred to me, naturally, as 1 think it would to any man who was not clean daft, that I might, without presumption, invoke the aid of the Holy Spirit, take up the Bible, read it prayerfully, and interpret it honestly, according to the best of my judgment, the opinion of the holy fathers and the infallible church to the contrary notwithstanding.

Up to this very moment I was negotiating with the holy church, and the holy church negotiating with me, through Bishop England, of Charleston, and a very reverend divine now in New York, for an arrangement of our _misunderstanding_. But we could not agree. There was now a barrier between us, which I could not pass. It was now with me, not a question of church or salaries, of location or domestic associations. The controversy now between me and the Romish church assumed a grave character: it was now a question with me of light or darkness, of life or death. I might have gone to Rome, fallen upon my knees, kissed the Pope's toe, and obtained the blessing of that poor old man. I might have acknowledged the _holy fathers_ were better authority and were safer guides in matters of faith, and in all things that concerned eternal life, than the holy Scriptures. It was an easy matter for me, so far as human effort was necessary, to cast aside the Bible altogether, and substitute in its place the sayings and opinions of the holy fathers, whose vanity often led them to suppose themselves inspired. Nothing was easier for me than to reject the Bible as a rule of faith, and permit myself to be governed by the babblings of popes and churchmen. This language, perhaps, may be deemed disrespectful, but it is not so. I cannot apprehend how anything I say can be deemed disrespectful, while I confine myself within the limits which the example of South, Jeremy Taylor and others have prescribed. No theologian, no one acquainted with history, sacred or profane, or with the eminent Dr. Robert South, one of the most learned divines of the seventeenth century, would accuse him of any intention to disparage the memory of the early Christians, who deserve to be honored, nor any of the doctrines which they maintained, unless they were universally admitted to be so absurd, that no man of common sense could sustain them. Yet this eminent man, speaking of the doctrine of _transubstantiation_, as taught by Chrysostom and Tertullian, calls it "_the most stupendous piece of nonsense, that ever was owned before a rational world_."

Dr. Jeremy Taylor, a distinguished Irish theologian, speaking of transubstantiation, as taught by the holy fathers, says, "_By this doctrine, the same thing stays in a place and goes away from it; it removes from itself and yet abides close by itself and in itself and out of itself; it is brought from heaven to earth, and yet is nowhere in the way, nor ever stirs out of heaven. It makes a thing contained bigger than that which contains it, and all Christ's body to go into a part of the body; his whole head into his own mouth, if he did eat the eucharist, as it is probable that he did., and certain that he might have done._" But the real presence of the body and blood of Jesus Christ was not the only nonsense which these holy fathers taught. They believed largely in the doctrine of miracles.

Ambrose, who was Bishop of Milan about the year 350, has been always, and is now, considered by the Popish church one of her best authorities. Papists tell us, that while he lay an infant in his cradle, a swarm of bees settled upon his lips as a presage of his future eloquence; and I believe it is generally admit ted, that if any of the fathers quoted by Papists is good authority in matters of faith, he is among the best. During my doubts whether I should take the fathers of the Romish church, or the holy Bible for my guide, I was led especially to the examination of the doctrines maintained by St. Ambrose and those taught in the Bible, and never before did I see that common, though vulgar saying, "comparisons are odious," more strictly fulfilled. I will take one, for example.

Among the many rhapsodies taught by St. Ambrose, a belief in Popish miracles was the most prominent He taught, as I have stated above, that the wafer which a Romish priest gives to a communicant, was the solid _flesh_ of Christ, and so solid, that he who received it might _stick his teeth into the flesh_.

The following is another specimen of the miracles in which he believed. The Empress Justina asked St. Ambrose for one of the Romish churches for the use of the Arian sect. He refused her, and was then about to consecrate that sumptuous basilic, afterwards called St. Ambrose's church. The people, as we are told, were anxious to deposit in the edifice the relics of some martyr,--relics were used by the holy father Ambrose then, as they are now by Popish priests,--to cure all diseases. The people insisted upon having them, and accordingly the holy father promised that they should be procured. Paulinus and Augustine tell us that "he was favored with a vision of two martyrs, who were never before heard of, named Gervusius and Protusius, who, hearing in heaven of the holy father's design to build a Popish church, instantly fled from their place of repose, and told him that they were murdered by infidel heretics in such a place, and on such a day; that if he would send men with spades and shovels to the place designated, they would find their bones, and to have them removed and deposited in the new church." The holy saint, in compliance with this glorious information, which he received in a vision, sent a number of men with spades, shovels, pickaxes, &c., and they soon found the "bodies of two men of wonderful stature." The heads were separate from the bodies, and the ground all round was soaked with blood. I use the language of the holy fathers themselves, translated into English, which, considering that all the flesh had already disappeared, may be considered a complication of miracles, unless it can be supposed, as the relator wickedly observes, "that it may be new created." As the workmen proceeded down towards the martyrs' resting-place, "their skeletons began to bestir themselves in such powerful sort, that an urn was thrown with violence from its pedestal, and rolled to the sacred spot; and some of the _possessed_, who had been brought upon such a promising occasion to be exorcised, began to howl and scream in the most lamentable ways, thus giving attestation to the power of glorious martyrs." "The relics, blood and bones were carefully removed to the new basilica, and on the road many miracles were wrought on diseased persons, who were so happy as to touch them; such was their virtue, that even to touch the pall which covered them was sufficient." Among others, a butcher, who had been a long time blind, was restored to sight. The blood of these martyrs was worked up into paste, and distributed all over Christendom, as an antidote against all diseases.

The writings of the _holy_ fathers abound with legends of this kind. We are told by them, that one of the Romish saints in Egypt, named Apia Till, suffered martyrdom, after being cut to pieces ten times each day, for ten successive days, by the tyrant, Maximin, and was every night put together by the angel Gabriel. Another tells us, that he has a bottle in which are corked up carefully some of the "rays of the star of Bethlehem, handed down to posterity by one of the wise men who went in search of the new-born Saviour." Another of those _infallible_ lunatics tells us, "that he has sealed up in perfect preservation some of the sounds of the bells used at Solomon's Temple."

Among the innumerable miracles in which the holy fathers of the Romish church believed, or pretended to believe, there are some so ridiculously incredible, that humanity itself, in the lowest depths of degradation, into which it has fallen, blushes at their repetition. It is gravely related by a Roman Catholic divine,--and no Roman Catholic in the United States disbelieves it,--that the sacrament of the _Eucharist_, or, to make it more intelligible to my readers, the wafer which the priest gives to the sick, and elevates to the people while saying mass, was conveyed into a bee-hive. In all probability, it dropped out of the pocket of some priest. The bees were found dead, and in the midst of them the wafer became an infant Christ, looking like other infants, but more beautiful. (See Peter Cluniac, first book, first chapter.) It is related by another Romish writer, that a hive of bees was once heard singing most harmoniously. A devout priest, passing by, happened to look in, and saw among them the holy sacrament of the Eucharist, to which they were singing glory and praise.