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been protected by CATHOLICS at a establish a system of toleration, by time of the utmost peril, after the fatal which men of all persuasions would battle of Worcester. During six days be at liberty to worship God accord. subsequent to that conflict, when ing to the dictates of his own cen every means were used by the rebels science; but he was a Catholic, and to obtain the person of his Majesty, therefore an object of suspicion among he was wholly under the care and pro- his Protestant subjects, who having tection of a few Catholic individuals, been torn and distracted during the among whom were the three honest four preceding reigns, with intestine Pendrels, poor labouring men, whom divisions and religious feuds, and thus neither the temptation of the reward become fit tools for the purposes of de of one thousand pounds, which was signing men, were made to believe offered for the king's person, nor the that the object of the king was to rethreat of the punishment of death | establish Popery and Slavery. The denounced against those who should popular voice was consequently turned conceal his Majesty, could move them against him, and he was under the ne to swerve from their loyalty and duty, cessity of deposing himself, to prevent which had been inculcated by their perhaps worse consequences falling religious principles, although Charles upon him. That James committed was a Protestant, and, as our anta- | faults no serious person will dispute, gonists would have it, a heretic.- but they were the same which had Charles having at length succeeded to been committed by his predecessors, the throne of his father, it was sup- and I believe it is not too much to say, posed from the protection which he that had Janes re-embraced the esta had received in the hour of danger blished creed, he might have died in from the loyalty of the Catholics, that possession of the throne as his brother some relaxation of the penal laws, Charles did. - James, however, pre which had been enacted against them, ferred the integrity of his conscienc would take place. These suspicions, to a dereliction of principle, and fore of course, awakened the jealousy of feited a kingdom to preserve his reli the Protestant faction, and various gion.-Having enumerated these in were the infamous schemes which were controvertible facts, and thus shewn put in practice to blacken the charac- from our own history that Protestants t ter of the Catholics and vilify their have practised the deposing power in the loyalty, which had shone so conspi- numerous instances, during the preced - ( cuous during the unhappy troubles of ing centuries, is it not astonishing-t his father's reign. - But when his bro- is it not disgusting-to find men, ther, the Duke of York, following this day of light and liberty, " urging, the dictates of his own conscience, with all the earnestness of bigotry and preferring his eternal welfare to and intolerance, the charge against the ephemeral advantages of his tem- the Catholics of this country, who poral interests, embraced the Catholic never yet were guilty of the act. For faith, the malice of the Protestants notwithstanding the various plots with could no longer be kept within bounds, which the Catholics have been ac and the pages of the historian, in re- cused during the reigns of Elizabeth, cording the last years of Charles's | James, and Charles II.; notwithwith reign, are filled with the base attempts standing the formidable weapons which were made to exclude the Duke which the naughty Jesuits were said from the sceptre of these realms, to to be armed, such as pardons for sins, which he was the heir-apparent. In absolutions, indulgences, masses, and this however they were frustrated, by the like; notwithstanding the horns the resolution of the king, and James of the Pope's Bulls, which have ter. succeeded to the throne: but short-rified so many of our English Prolived was his reign. James wished to testants-Elizabeth reigned upwards

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of forty-four years, without having her skin once scratched; James reign ed twenty-two years with the same good fortune; and Charles above twenty-four years from the time of his restoration; and all without meeting with any mishap from the Papists.timents might serve to excite the peo-On the contrary, however, Charles the First, who reigned twenty-four years, passed the latter part of his life in open warfare with his Protestant subjects, which they ended by their decapitating him; and James his son did not reign five years before he found it necessary to seek protection in a foreign land, from the fury and intemperance of his Protestant people. - shall pass over, as they are too fresh on our memories, the many instances which have taken place within the last twenty-five years of the deposition of Sovereign Princes on the Continent, in which the doctrines of the Catholic Church could have no effect, as the Pope and Catholic Sovereigns were the principal sufferers; but I cannot help noticing, if we are to believe the public prints, that notwithstanding an embargo is laid upon Catholic opinion on this subject, some of our most able statesmen and legislators are not averse to the deposing power at this day, when Catholic kings are the objects of censure. The Morning Chronicle of the 9th of November last, in its reports of the debates in the House of Commons on the preceding evening, states that the much-lamented Mr. Whitbread, in alluding to the conduct of the Bourbon family since their restoration to the throne of France, said, "If such Conduct was actually that which was pursued, the inevitable consequence would be, either that every think like liberty would be destroyed, or that the people must rise, and again drive from their thrones persons who so misconducted themselves."-The same paper, of the 2d of March following, The Protestant legislature of this reports, that Mr. Horner, on the even country enact a law by which the Soing before, in the debate in the Com-vereign is excommunicated on becom mons, respecting the conduct of the ing a Catholic, and deposed from bis Governor of Gibraltar and the Eng- royal seat; and yet when the Catho

dish Consul at Cadiz in surrendering some Spanish patriots to the present Government of Spain, said, that "he was anxious that the House should give the most energetic expression to its feelings, in the hope that such sen

ple of Spain to re-assert their rights TO DEPOSE Ferdinand, and bring him to condign punishment....and that he would maintain that that despot was an usurper, to whom no allegiance was legitimately due." Mr. J.P. Grant is also stated to have said, "he hoped that detestable and contemptible ty rant might be driven from his throne." -With this chain of evidence before us; with the testimony of the statute. book, that, even at this day, the Sovereign of these realms cannot embrace the Catholic faith, or marry a Catholic, without being deposed from his throne by the laws of the land; with the knowledge that part of the blood and taxes of the nation has been applied to the purpose of assisting our allies to depose the late Emperor of France; that a Protestant English Secretary of State was willing to consent to the deposition of the present Catholic King of Saxony; and that Protestant statesmen assert the right of subjects to depose Catholic Sovereigns; is it possible for the Catholic, if he has the feelings of a man and a citizen, not to consider himself insulted and degraded at being obliged to appear in an open court of justice, to swear that it is not an article of his religion that princes excommunicated by the Pope may be deposed or murdered; and to renounce the opinion that princes excommunicated by the Pope, or by any authority whatsoever, may be deposed or murdered by their subjects, or any person whatsoever. Was there ever such a system of cruel intolerance and unparalleled inconsistency as I have here displayed.

lic applies to this legislature for relief | broachers of heresy and those who

from the grievances under which he labours, it causes him to reject upon oath, before he can obtain that relief, the opinion that princes may be deposed by their subjects under any authority WHATSOEVER. Thus then the English Protestants admit and assume the power of deposing their own and foreign Sovereigns under certain cases; but compel the Catholics to swear that no authority whatever can authorise them to do it. Good God! what further degradation and insult are we doomed to undergo. By the high churchman or Tory, we are told that it is dangerous to admit us into the pale of the Constitution, because our religion encourages treason and the deposition of kings;-by the low churchman or Whig, we are accused of being enemies to freedom, because, as Catholics, we admit the doctrine of the divine right of kings ;-and by the bigots of each party we are condemned for believing all those to be heretics who differ from us in faith, all which are calumnious errors. Thus, whichever way we turn ourselves, our religion | is the anvil on which our opponents hammer out their objections against us, aud Protestant arrogance and ignorance is the ground-work for Catholic proscription and suffering. For what but the most shameless arrogance, aided by the profoundest ignorance, could have caused the newspaper edi tors to circulate the unfounded asser tions on which I have been dilating.What but gross and malignant ignorance could induce The Morning Chronicle to affirm, in the name of Serjeant Best, that Dr. Milner had asserted, in direct violation of his oath, that the Pope could in extraordinary cases depose heretical kings, and that the king of England would certainly be pronounced to be such? Had the editor known the real opinion of Catholics on this subject, and he ought to have informed himself of them, before he sent forth this false assertion to the world, he would then have been able to specificate between the first

believe in erroneous doctrines with sincerity, not knowing but they are grounded in truth. He would have been able to have ascertained, that it is not every one who erreth in religion that is deemed by Catholics to be a heretic, but he only who wilfully coineth or adhereth to a false opinion, after he knows it to be so.-In a word, it is of no consequence to a Catholic whether the king is a Protestant or a Catholic-a Lutheran or a Calvinist

that is a matter which relates to God and himself. If he governs ac cording to the laws of the land, and rules with equity and justice; if he endeavours to make his subjects hap py and contented, the Catholic will feel equal gratitude and affection to wards him as any other class of his subjects, nor will he trouble himself to enquire of what faith the sovereign is.-That, as I before observed, is subject which concerns his own salva tion, and on such a delicate point he ought to be left, as well as every indi vidual in the state, wholly to himself The Globe says that Mr. Serjeant Bes required a clear explanation of many of the doctrines which the Irish Ca tholics had promulgated. One would have supposed, if this assertion The Globe be true, that as the Catho lics had made an open declaration their principles, the legal knowledge of the learned Serjeant would have enabled him to ascertain what their doctrines were; and if not, he had only to consult the approved works of our divines on this interesting subject. and he would certainly obtain the ne cessary information he is said to have required. However, since The Globe has desired to be instructed as to the principles of the Irish Catholics, and as I am desirous of conveying all the knowledge in my power to our sadly ignorant Protestants, I shall conclude this article with the following extract taken from the third volume of Reeve's History of the Christian Church, P 247:"A Roman Catholic is a pro fessed follower of Jesus Christ. With

a firm faith he believes all the divine | always done, and thereby exhibits to truths which Jesus Christ, his only the Almighty that sovereign honour of Redeemer, has revealed to the holy adoration, which cannot be given to Catholic Church, and nothing more: any creature without the guilt of idohe admits no private opinions of men latry. He, in fine, believes, that for into his religious creed. From the the comfort of repenting sinners, Christ Church, the infallible and spotless has given to the apostles, and their spouse of Christ, he receives the ca- successors in the priesthood, a power nonical books of scripture for his rule to remit sius for all such as seek it of faith, according to that sense, in with a true contrition of heart. Such, which she has always understood in brief, is the Roman Catholic's rethem. In all doubts, and in all con-ligious character in matters of faith. troverted points of doctrine, he holds To form his moral character, he takes her to be the supreme judge, and to the gospel for his rule; he holds its her decisions he humbly submits, as precepts to be binding in conscience, Christ commands. In his religious and its counsels optional, but still character he pays to God alone that very meritoriously embraced by those Supreme and divine worship, which who aspire to a more eminent degree elongs to the sovereign creator of all of religious perfection. In his civil bings. The angels and saints in hea- character he is submissive to the conen he does not worship, but honours stituted powers of the state, as the the friends and happy favourites of apostle directs; by education he is od; he commemorates their virtues, taught to cultivate peace and social ows virtuous by their example, and order; by principle he is a friend to gs to be remembered by them before his country, and to the government throne of mercy; he respects their under which he lives. Hence, while lies, as precious remnants of a he acknowledges in the Bishop of hristian friend. Their images and Rome all those spiritual prerogatives, pictures he sets before his eyes, which Christ gave to St. Peter, the pays a suitable respect to them; head of the apostles, for the govern. at he makes them not his idols; he ment of the whole Church, he admits either worships nor invokes them, for no obligation of allowing in him any knows they cannot see, nor hear, civil jurisdiction over the independent Mor help him. It is a gross slander to rights of Sovereigns in their temporal say, that he adores or renders divine concerns."-Here then our opponents Worship to the Virgin Mary: for, al- have a just delineation of the religious, hough he looks up to her with pecu- moral, and civil character of a Roman ar reverence as to the Mother of God, Catholic, from the pen of a Clergyman ad in that quality superlatively raised of the Church of Rome, and with bove the whole host of saints and an- this true and concise description I take yet he still views her in the li- my leave of the phantasmagoria of the sited sphere of a pure creature. In Deposing Power, as imputed to Cahe ineffable mystery of the holy Eu

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arist he adores Jesus Christ, the ternal Son of the Father, true God nd true man, because in the plain and bvious meaning of Christ's words, He believes his sacred body and blood | lo be there really present, under the

tholics.

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IRISH AND ENGLISH CATHOLICS. In the epitome of this number will be found the Resolutions of the Aggregate Meeting held in Dublin on the 4th of this month; and also a Minute of the proceedings of the British Catholic Board, as published by the private Committee. By the latter it as the prophet Malachi fore-appears that the Board has resolved old, and as the Catholic church has to petition the Legislature early in the ORTHOD, JOUR, VOL. III.

outward forms of bread and wine. In the adorable sacrifice of the Mass he offers up to God the pure and clean oblation,

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that the sound part of our body, who prefer an open and undisguised method of business to a Machiavellian system, will permit itself to be ruled by max. ims which it condemns and despises; but, on the contrary, will oppose the supporters and promoters of such mis

truth is sure to triumph over error, i will become victorious in the contest -The method pursued by our Irish brethren to obtain emancipation has been such as must be admired and approved of by all who wish to follo that old and trite adage, “Honesty i the best policy."-Frank, open, art less and sincere, they follow the ho nourable track pointed out to them by their Religion and the Constitution, and unawed by the threats or calum nies of the bigot, or the specious pro

next session, and it would appear, from the language used on the occasion, that the sentiments of its members have undergone a change, did not other circumstances, to which I shall call the attention of the reader, indicate that the same system of duplicity and chicanery still predomi-guided intentions, and in the end, a nates in the acting Committee or Private Board, which has produced all the unfortunate divisions by which our little body is at present assailed. How long this system is to be sufferedhow long we are to remain without a public organ to counteract the evil effects of the dishonourable practices pursued by the leaders of the Catholic Board, is a question which I am not competent to answer; but I do most sincerely hope that some respectable and public-spirited individuals will step forward and form a Volun-mises of pretended friends, they hav tary Association upon a plan similar to that adopted by the Catholics of Ireland, and the Electors of Westminster, by which a rallying point may be obtained to collect the sense of our body in this island, and convince the members of this Board, that unless they pursue measures alike honourable to their own characters and co-incident to the wishes of the people, they must be content to remain, as they now are, a head without a body. For my own part, nothing would give me more sincere pleasure, than to see the representatives of our ancient and noble families take that station in our affairs which their rank and character entitle them to; but while they suffer themselves to be dictated to and led by a few designing men, whose conduct has been so oftendered as turbulent and disaffecte and so clearly developed as forming one chain of intrigue and deceit; while they permit their names to be used as sanctioning proceedings calculated to mislead not only our Protestant brethren, but also the Catholic public; while, I say, such things as these are not merely winked at, but, I am fearful, encouraged by some few of the heads of our great Catholic families, it is impossible to expect

boldly vindicated their principles from the insults and slanders heaped up them, and knowing themselves to the aggrieved party, they claim the civil rights as an act of justice due oppressed integrity, and call upon Legislature to restore them to same state of political existence th formerly enjoyed, until the violence bigotry, villainy, and religious phre zy deprived them of it.-Would God the same could be said of tho men who form the Board of Britis Catholics.-But, unfortunately, the schemes have been the very opposite to the measures adopted by the Irish and the consequence is, that the for mer are praised by the sycophants an minions of power as the paragons loyalty, while the latter are cons

subjects. That I have not overcharge this comparison of the two bodies, a drawn by some of our anti-poper men, I refer the reader to the pul lished speeches and writings of m Lord Redesdale, and others, wher he will discover the most fulsom praises in favour of the English Ca tholics, and the severest censures of our patriotic brethren in Ireland. That the commendations bestowed on

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