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OUR RELATIONS WITH ROME.

A CORRESPONDENT of the Times, referring to the flippant remark in the letter signed "Anglo-Romanus," that the only obstacle to establishing diplomatic relations with the Vatican, arose out of some musty statute, has pointed out other and "actual living hindrances" on the part of Rome herself, and such as Pius IX. only has power-if he has the power-to remove. These hindrances consist of the following three items:

"Imprimis. Up to this hour, the legitimate title of Queen Victoria to the throne of Britain, is unrecognized by the Prince-Prelate of Rome.

"2. Up to this hour, the sentences of excommunication and deposition, put forth by the predecessors of Pius IX. against the Queen of England and all her adherents, are unrevoked by him.

"3. Up to this hour, the bull, 'In Cana Domini,' put forth by Paul V., whereby our Queen, our clergy, our nobles, our whole people (excepting only the Pope's adherents among them) are excommunicated and anathematized for disobedience to the Roman Pontiff-which sentence of anathema is appointed to be renewed afresh every year on Maunday-Thursday-is uncancelled, unrepudiated by Pius IX."

Our readers will approve of the remark, that "it is morally impossible that the Queen's advisers, if they entertain respect for their Sovereign, or would retain for themselves the respect of their fellow-subjects or of the world, can advise her to send an embassy or mission to a court where her title to the crown is unrecognized, or to a Prince by whom she and her subjects are yearly denounced to be excommunicated and anathematized." For our own part, however, we have no wish that that these hindrances should be removed. We rejoice in the political obstacles to a closer alliance between the Pontifical head of Romanism and the royal head of the Anglican schism; obstacles which more than justify that " reserve towards Rome which, from the promulgation of the bulls of deposition NOVEMBER-1847.

against Queen Elizabeth, has had the sanction of all British statesmen and of every British Parliament;" but the removal of which would not by any means obviate all the objections which lie in the way of friendly relations with the court of Rome.

It is remarkable, however, that, when the subject was recently mooted in the House of Commons, no reference was made to these serious impediments on the side of Rome-to these unrepealed Papal disabilities upon the Protestant sovereign and people of Great Britain. Not that these furnish any just reason for refusing to concede to our Roman Catholic fellow-subjects all the rights of citizens; but they ought at least to moderate the insolent tone in which sometimes those claims have been advocated. We want no concessions from Rome; but, in spite of the patriotic reforms of the well-meaning Pio Nono, we have reason to be on our guard against both the encroachments and the intrigues of the Vatican and its janissaries.

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For instance, the Papal edict restraining Roman Catholic priests in this country from celebrating mixed marriages except upon an engagement, in writing, that all the children of the marriage shall be trained in the faith of the Roman Catholic parent-is a comparatively recent infringement of the civil rights of English subjects by the foreign jurisdiction of the "Prince Prelate of Rome,' and has been confirmed by the present Pope. Again, the furious denunciation of the English Bible Society by Gregory XVI., has been reiterated in the encyclical letter of his successor. These are fresh aggressions of intolerance. It is singular enough, that, while the expremier of England has been doing himself honour by pleading the cause of the British and Foreign Bible Society in what has been styled his manifesto, the late governor of Malta, Sir Patrick Stuart, is found fault with (by the Post) for having "allowed himself to be persuaded to preside at meetings of Mis

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sionary and Bible Societies, while filling the high office of her majesty's representative and governor over a Roman Catholic people!" By and by, it will be regarded, we suppose, as an offence against the religious prejudices of a Catholic people, for a Protestant nobleman to preside at a meeting of a Bible Society in Ireland. The writer in the Post hints, moreover, that the preference shown by the Anglican Bishop of Gibraltar for Malta as a residence during the greater part of the year, may perhaps be misconstrued by the natives, and that he had better, therefore, Puseyite though he be, make himself scarce. "We have reason to know," adds our contemporary, "that a body of Jesuits lately established at Malta, acting under the auspices of the Congregation of the Propaganda of Rome, have been welcomed by the generality of the inhabitants, as a counteraction to the supposed influence of the Bishop of Gibraltar in public affairs." This is a tolerably plain intimation of what is going on, and will not, we hope, be altogether lost upon her majesty's ministers.

By the way, the Malta Mail reiterates its warning to the British government respecting the views of the French on Malta, of which, it seems, some palpable and unequivocal indications have lately been afforded. The Malta Times, while treating these apprehensions as false and ridiculous alarms, admits that France has long cast a covetous eye upon Malta. seems a strange moment for demanding that this important station should be placed under a civil, not a military governor.

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We find from the Tablet, that "the Rev. Richard Burchall, O.S.B., Superior of the College of the English Benedictines at Douai, has been nominated by his holiness, Pope Pius IX., coadjutor bishop to his grace the Archbishop of Sydney, at present in England."

This is another instance of the benevolent attention, which the courts of Rome and France are bestowing just now upon the spiritual condition of the British colonies. We have lying before us, a pamphlet by Dr. Dunmore Lang, entitled " Popery

in Australia and the Colonies," which merits public attention, as laying open the ambitious designs and proselytizing schemes of the Papacy in that region.

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"This prodigious influx of Irish Popery into the colony of New South Wales," says Dr. Lang, occurring as it did so soon after the appointment of a Romish bishop for New South Wales, and a French Roman Catholic bishop for New Zealand, necessarily gave a prodigious stimulus to the Romanists of the Australian colonies, and induced the zealots of that communion to form the most extravagant designs, and to take measures for the speedy reduction, not only of all these colonies, but of the whole Southern Hemisphere, under the degrading yoke of the Man of Sin. With this view, Bishop Polding and Dr. Ullathorne both returned to Europe about the year 1840; and the former, from his past, but especially for his prospective services to the popedom, was created an archbishop and a count of the Papal States by the Pope. With this increase of honours, as well as with a large reinforcement of priests, Sisters of Charity, ecclesiastical students, and Christian brothers (or schoolmasters under a vow of celibacy and devotion to the Papacy), Dr. Polding returned to the colony early in the year 1842.

"Since Bishop Polding's return to the colony in 1842, three suffragan bishops have been appointed and ordained for the other Australian colonies; viz., Dr. Willson, (a convert from the Church of England, or rather from Puseyism), for the island of Van Diemen's Land, ordained in London; Father Murphy, long a priest in New South Wales, for South Australia, ordained in Sydney--Bishop Polding, Bishop Willson, and Dr. Pompallier, the French Roman Catholic Bishop from New Zealand, performing the ceremony; and priest Brady, also for some time one of Bishop Polding's priests in New South Wales, and a person of no great reputation there, for Western Australia or Swan River, ordained at Rome under the very eye of the Pope! There has also been a coadjutor bishop ordained in Sydney very re

cently for New Zealand, a M. Viard, another Frenchman; for Archbishop Polding, Bishop Pompallier, and Bishop Murphy have all come home to Europe during the past year-each setting sail from his own locality, not to excite observation-doubtless to collect funds, both on the Continent and in the United Kingdom, and to concert measures for the speedy subjection of the Australian colonies and the southern hemisphere generally to the domination of the Pope. It is also understood, that as soon as Dr. Polding returns from Rome-with a cardinal's hat, as is expected, Dr. Geoghegan, the Roman Catholic priest at Melbourne, is to proceed to Europe to be ordained a bishop for Port Philip, and to beat up for recruits and money for the advancement of the Papacy in that splended province.

"In the meantime, the Romish Church of France, instigated, it is said, and supported by the consort of King Louis Philippe, has recently sent out a bishop, Dr. Douarre, with an establishment of missionary priests, &c., for the large island of New Caledonia, and another, M. Paille, recently killed by the natives, for the more northerly islands of Western Polynesia, in addition to those it had previously established at the more easterly groupes in connection with their piratical settlement in Tahiti.

"The ambitious designs and proselytizing schemes of the Papacy in all these movements and proceedings, are as clear as noon-day, from the establishment of Romish bishoprics in the colonies of South Australia and Swan River; for, in the former of these colonies, the whole number of the Roman Catholic population does not exceed 1,500, out of a total population of 22,000; whereas, in the latter, I am confident it cannot exceed 1,000 altogether, the entire population of Swan River not exceeding 5,000. When Bishop Polding recommended the appointment of a Romish bishop for Swan River, which he had never visited himself at the time, he had, doubtless, greatly over-estimated the importance of that small colony; for, when Bishop Brady arrived at his destination with his array of priests, and Sisters of Charity, and Christian

brothers, direct from Rome, it was found that there was no room for the half of them, and several of the priests had, consequently, to come on to New South Wales. But these supernumeraries were not allowed to remain long inactive for want of a station, and were accordingly ordered off for Port Essington, on the northern coast of Australia, in April or May last; in order, doubtless, that it might be reported in Rome that the indefatigable agents of the Papacy had made a vigorous and simultaneous attack on all the four coasts of the vast continental island of New Holland, and that, as Protestants of all denominations in the Australian colonies are remarkably indifferent on the subject of Popery, the prospect of the eventual subjugation of the whole continent, if not of the whole Southern Hemisphere, to the Papacy, is bright and hopeful."

It is a strange infatuation which has led British statesmen to pet and humour, and subsidize and patronize Popery everywhere but in Ireland;though, even there, they would enter into alliance with it if they durst. The Post, however, while disclaiming all hatred of the Roman Catholic religion, and willing to sacrifice the interests of Protestantism to the religious prejudices of a Roman Catholic people and to the intrigues of the Jesuits in any other country, inveighs in good set terms against "the iniquity of those semi-savage persons in Ireland, who, after Maynooth education, engraft their own petty despotism upon the Romanist system of ecclesiastical influence." Who would have expected to find a Tory journalist regretting, in the following terms, the loss of O'Connell?

"While Mr. O'Connell lived and superintended, he was able to prevent the intolerable and offensive extremes of democratic despotism which now exist in all directions without let or hindrance. His corrupt system was comparatively safe under his clever guidance. The system remains, but the guidance exists no longer. An explosion is at hand. The coarse cunning or brutal violence of the parochial agitators and tyrants, sent forth from Maynooth, with narrow

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state of exasperation even beyond their control. Then opposite parties will come to blows; and

man there at to this this conclusion

are who, feeling that it must come at last, say, The sooner the

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bet is not the language, he st observed, of an Anti-Maynooth or "No-Popery" journalist, but of a writer whose extreme courtesy to Romanists has brought him under the suspicion of being not a very sound Protestant, Yet, these " "parochial agitators and tyrants" are the men whom it is projected to take into the state pay, upon the principle, we presume, that an old offender sometimes makes the best policeofficer. But let us be just even to Romanists. It is not Popery per se,

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whethern Ireland, in Malta, in whether in India, in Austrália, in Switzerland,

Cochin China, in Tahiti, that is at the bottom of all the turbulence and mischief, but Jesuitism, that diaboli cal conspiracy which has once before convulsed Europe, which is everywhere struggling to regain its former ascendancy, which scruples not to trike at the Pontifical throne itself, when resisted in its machinations, which meets us everywhere, either as a foreign or as a domestic foe, yet, of the very y existence of which British journalists Taffect to be incredulous. It is bigotry, fanaticism, childish ignorance forsooth, to suppose the Jesuits of 1847 bear any resemblance to those whose system was laid bare by Pascal, to the scorn and indigna tion of Europe, and whose traitorous machinations led to their expulsion and suppression by every Roman Catholic potentate. This delusion cannot, however, last much longerora e and a 19 10 asad ton

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OUT of three hundred Roman Catholic missionaries, in different parts of the world, more than one half are Frenchmen. Such a fact as this sufficiently proves the importance attached to that nation. Take another fact of the same kind. In the Propaganda Society at Lyons (not to be confounded with the institution of the same name at Rome) they have men educated for foreign missions. This society raised, last year, four millions of francs, or nearly £167,000 sterling. Ten years ago, it did not receive more than fifty thousand dollars (about £10,600). But now the Leopold Society, which is much less important, raises forty thousand dollars (£8,500). And besides these, there is the Louis and Bourbon

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Society, much more important than the last mentioned. Altogether, we have the enormous amount of nearly nine hundred thousand dollars (£193,125) raised by Rome for foreign missions every year in these three societies of France and Belgium. Ten years ago, they did not raise the fourth of that amount; and ten years from this time, they will raise five times as much. When this corrupt Church applies herself to the work, she says to her sons "You must help us," "and resorts to ten thousand ways of getting money that we cannot approve, and of course cannot employ. The priest says to the rich man about to die, "Give us your money to found this mission, and we will see to it, that if you have to go

through purgatory, you shall stay in it as short a time as possible." They have, moreover, everywhere organized associations, for the purpose of procuring funds, besides bulls and indulgences of all kinds, to juggle sous from the poor, and fortunes from the rich. With all these appliances at their command, they can, with perfect ease, in ten years from this time, raise ten times as much as they are getting now. They have also labourers in abundance; for their system being built upon celibacy, puts it in their power to provide and to support many more than we can. They are mustering all their forces, and before long the struggle will come. Their efforts are directed mainly to England and the United States. They are wise. They have their prayers expressly for this object. I have attended their meetings, and have heard them pray for the conversion of England. They feel a deep interest in this subject. They have not been able to gain any footing in Russia, and I do not think they will; but as to England and the United States, they are very sanguine, as I can assure you, from what I have heard at Rome and elsewhere.

Suffer me now to call your attention to what ought to be a

In 1819, it was with great difficulty that a Bible Society was set on foot at Paris, for want of materials, But how different is it now! In the chief cities and towns, you will find little bands of intelligent men and women, who are ready to put their hands to the blessed work. So there is a great beginning. What further is wanted is more money and more men. If you had five hundred men to drop into France, and means to support them, they would find their places before a year, and enough to do. The colporteurs circulate the Scriptures everywhere, in a way of which you have no idea; and so effectually do they do the work, that a gentleman assured me a short time ago, he could, at any time, establish without difficulty, in the course of twelve months, as many churches in various parts of France. The clear enunciation of the Gospel takes the French Catholic by surprise. How often have I heard men say to me, when I have explained the Gospel, as understood by Protestants, "And is this Christianity? We had no conception of any other Christianity than that which we saw in our churches and in the ceremonies practised there." The Wesleyans have done much for France, but I would say to my friends of that communion,

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Some of your best works are translated and scattered all through France; and this is a great thing in the work of preparation. Then there are about two hundred colporteurs, and one hundred evangelists, and besides these, about two hundred ministers, connected with the Protestant Esta blished Church, who preach "Christ crucified." Others there who, though they do not yet preach the Gospel clearly, are coming more and more to the acknowledgment of the truth. And there are a hundred outside the Establishment, including Wesleyan missionaries, who are mostly Frenchmen, aiding this glorious work. In 1815 there was nothing like this.

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