duced" into vice," and imbibe it from their parents," to the same merciful judgment; but does that charitable hope imply, that pious Christians conceive themselves free from all obligation to discountenance the existence and increase of such offenders, or that they could conscientiously engage to support an establishment to promote seduction; and to perpetuate an inheritance of iniquity and vice, from parents to children for ever? Who could listen to such a perversion of every moral principle? Yet, after trying to make us believe that your Church allows you a similar perversion of her most evident rules of faith and action, you have the courage to retort upon us, and endeavour to stain the Protestant Church with the black spot of persecution, which is indelibly stamped on your forehead!

VII.

"Such, then (say you), being the tenets of the Roman Catholic Church on this important point, may want of charity upon it be objected to her?

It cannot be objected to her by a Protestant of the Established Church of England, as the Athanasian creed and its damnatory clause, form a part of her liturgy; or by a Protestant of the Established Church of Scotland, as the Protestants of that Church, in their Profession of Faith of 1568, that out of the Church there is neither life nor everlasting happiness; or by a Protestant of the French Huguenot Church, as in their Catechism they profess, in their explanation of the tenth article of the creed, that out of the Church there is nothing but death and damnation*."

say,

As much, Sir, as you "love a strong argument," so much do I detest an evasion, especially when not free from a spice of malice. An involved sophism gives exercise to my mind; an irrelevant answer, with an air of defiance, affords it only to my patience.

Ever since the Gospel was published, there has not been a Christian, who has not limited the peculiar salvation which that Gospel proclaims, to those, who by faith in its doctrines, belong to

* Vindication, p. xxxv and xxxvi.

the Church of Christ. If this be intolerance, we all plead guilty to the charge. But there is only one Church, which has made belief, upon her authority, an essential part of the Christian Faith, without which, no man can be saved. The Church of England declares in the Athanasian creed, that such as do not believe rightly, either of the Trinity, or of the Incarnation, have not true Christian Faith; and are, consequently, excluded from the privileges of the Gospel. But yours professes, that if a man should cordially embrace every article of her creed, and yet reject that, which makes it necessary to believe them on her authority, and within the spiritual pale of the Pope; that man is excluded from the Gospel salvation. Do you perceive no difference between your uncharitableness and what you will have it to be our uncharitableness? Our un

charitableness, as you name it, cannot, after all, break out into persecution; yours must. Protestants do not pretend to possess a living and infallible oracle: and though the sincere among them most firmly believe in the doctrines propounded by their Churches from the Scriptures,

they admit the possibility, that they may be wrong in some points. How then could we conscientiously molest any man, for the sake of urging him into our particular Church, when in injuring him we should do that which cannot possibly be right, with an object which we do not believe to be indispensably necessary for his final happiness? Strongly persuaded as we are, that no system of Christianity has blended with the true doctrines of the Gospel so many or so dangerous errors as Popery; yet we can never fall into the lamentable mistake, that it is absolutely necessary for the supreme spiritual good of mankind, to harass or seduce you out of your Church. Compare the conduct of the Church of England with the acknowledged proceedings of your own, at this moment. Does our Church set her snares on the territories where yours prevails? Does the Church of England call Italy, or France, or Spain, her mission? Does she keep a numerous establishment of bishops and priests in any of those countries, as the congregation de Propaganda keeps among us? What, then, can be the cause of this remarkable difference of conduct?

F

Surely it is not heedlessness, on our part, as to the spiritual interests of our fellow-creatures; for Protestant England is as active in spreading Christianity among the heathen, as you are in spreading Popery among us. The different conduct of the two Churches, in regard to each other, arises from the deep-seated intolerance of yours, and the settled toleration of ours. Yours considers Protestant England in the light that we consider the countries where we send missions. We are heathen to her; you are deluded Christians to us. We certainly believe, that Roman Catholics have in their Church more obstacles to salvation through Christ, than any other denomination of Christians: but as we know that, nevertheless, you belong to Him, and we have no infallible living authority, which, embodying the passions and interests of a set of men in its oracles, may call upon us, as we hope for salvation, to destroy, or injure, or any way disturb you; the duty of Christian charity can never be made an instrument of persecution among us.

You assert that your duty with regard to us is