man's own avowal, to be carried into execution in England, becomes inconsistent with the safety of the State, for it saps the foundation of the pillars of obedience to the law of the land, upon which the safety of the State rests.

Let us for a moment turn our eyes from England to a neighbouring country, where the Roman Catholic Church is protected alike with all other religious communions, and is not merely tolerated, as in England. "How little fear," says Dr. Wiseman, in his first Lecture, "is entertained in that country (Belgium) of dangers to the State from the action of the Papal power, in parcelling out the land into spiritual territories, how simple the definition of the reciprocal rights of a Church not established in monopoly, and of the civil government." Be it so admitted for the purpose of the argument, yet very considerable fear has been entertained in that country of danger to the State from the ecclesiastical encroachments of the Roman Catholic Bishops upon the law of the land, and from a one-sided reciprocity on their part. For instance, by the 84th Article of the Loi Communale of March 30. 1836, the Council of the Commune was to nominate the professors and teachers attached to the communal establishments for public instruction. By the 6th Article of the Loi Organique de l'Instruction Primaire, "religious and moral instruction was to be given at the communal colleges, under the direction of the ministers of the worship professed by the majority of the pupils of the school,". ,”—the minority being dispensed with from attendance on such occasions. It was also provided by the 7th Article, that "the religious and moral instruction should be carried on under the superintendance of the delegates of the heads of each

denomination of worship (chefs des cultes)," who, as well as the ministers of religion, should further have the right of inspecting the schools at all times. Not content with so liberal a provision on the part of the State, and with so exclusive a dominion in religious matters, the Bishops made secret conventions with the communal authorities, the purport of which was to concede to the Bishops a veto on all the professors and teachers, as a condition of allowing their clergy to give any religious instruction in the communal schools. The existence of these secret conventions became disclosed first of all in the diocese of Tournai, when it was found, on inquiry, that not fewer than seventeen conventions had been secretly enforced by the Bishops on the communal authorities. The State was accordingly called upon, in 1845, to put down this attempt to fetter the freedom of the communal authorities in the discharge of the duties imposed upon them by the civil power; and it accordingly took the necessary measures to prevent the communal colleges maintained by the State from becoming, as in fact they were on the point of becoming, colleges of the Roman Catholic Church. Since that time the Roman Catholic Bishops have refused to allow their clergy to give any religious instruction in the communal colleges; and in that respect, the new law of last year on Secondary Instruction is not yet carried into execution by the Bishops. Surely Belgium, to which a further reference will be made in the next chapter, cannot be safely quoted in illustration of the political harmlessness of Papal Aggression.

A further observation may be added upon the attitude of the Roman Catholic Church in Belgium. It is well known that the Belgian clergy gave in their adherence en masse, with a very few exceptions, to the

famous Encyclical Letter of Gregory XVI. (18 Sept. 1832). That Encyclical Letter condemned, in the most absolute manner, "that absurd and erroneous maxim, or rather wild notion, that liberty of conscience ought to be assured and guaranteed to every person.' Whether the Pope on this occasion adopted a sound view, it boots not to inquire; but this at least may be said, that it would ill become those who deny liberty of conscience to others, to demand, under the plea of liberty of conscience, an impunity in infringing the solemn sanctions of the Law of the Land.

*“Atque ex hoc putidissimo indifferentismi fonte absurda illa fluit ac erronea sententia, seu potius deliramentum, asserendam esse ac vindicandam cuilibet libertatem conscientiæ.". Epistola Encyclica Gregorii Divina Providentia Papa XVI.”

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CHAP. II.

It is said by Dr. Wiseman that the Emancipation Act (10 Geo. 4. c. 7.), preceded and followed by others of less magnitude, has admitted the (Roman) Catholics of the British Empire to complete religious toleration. In its strict sense this statement is correct. But in granting them complete religious toleration, the law has not conceded to them the full power of ecclesiastical action, such as they possess in countries foreign to the dominion of her Majesty, e.g., within the territory of the Holy See itself, for they are restrained from many ecclesiastical observances and practices, in which they may elsewhere indulge, by the charter itself of their political rights. Besides, it may be observed, that the 10 Geo. 4. c. 7. is not so much. entitled to be regarded as the Toleration Act of her Majesty's Roman Catholic subjects as 31 Geo. 3. c. 32. (A. D. 1791), which removed the pains and penalties attaching by the Statute Law to the exercise of the Roman Catholic religion. The Relief Act (A.D. 1829), on the other hand, or, as it is commonly called, the Emancipation Act, bestowed upon them a political status, many years after they had been allowed freely to exercise their religion. It was further an Act of the Imperial Parliament, and at once extended to Ireland, but it made no change in the religious status of the Roman Catholics. Dr. Wiseman, however, contends "that when Emancipation was granted to

(Roman) Catholics, full power was given to them to have an Episcopate." Now the Toleration Act (s. 5.) had permitted them to have Bishops, when it allowed their "ministers of any higher rank or order than priests," to perform ecclesiastical functions in their assemblies for religious worship, whereas the Emancipation Act introduced no change in the law with regard to their Bishops, nor did it by any of its of its provisions give to the Roman Catholics full power to have an Episcopate, if by that term is meant a Hierarchy, or body of episcopal rulers. There is a double fallacy in Dr. Wiseman's argument; the first is in the matter of fact, and the second in the mode of statement. The first has been disposed of already, and as to the second the fallacy consists in not distinguishing a collective body of Bishops, from an aggregate number of Bishops. Where the Bishops of a country can act collectively as a body, as well as separately as individuals, there is said to be in that country an Episcopate*, but when they can only act as individuals, whether singly or aggregated together in numbers, there is no Episcopate, although there are Bishops. Now that this is not an ideal distinction may be gathered from the course of events in a neighbouring country. In Belgium, for instance, where the Roman Catholic Church is protected, and has been guaranteed by the 14th Article of the Constitution of the land, alike with every other religious community, the public exercise of its religious worship, there are of course Roman Catholic Bishops, but there is no Roman Catholic Episcopate. The Bishops have indeed sought to obtain a recognition of themselves in a corporate capacity from the State, but the State has distinctly refused to re

* 66 Episcopat dignité d'Evêque; il se dit aussi d'un corps d'Evêques." - Dict. de l'Académie Française.