for which you were very properly punished at the New London Tavern, on May 1st, 1813, as that publication shews. Still we trusted, that your stereotype edition, when it did appear, would afford some light to your stupidly ignorant people, and enable them to quench their poor thirsty souls with the water of God's word, though flowing through a muddy channel; but, behold! you have raised it up to such a price, that those whom you engaged at your first meet ing, to instruct by means of it, cannot at all reach it! Begone! you shall never deceive us more." faith in the Table of Controversies, which had accompanied the former editions of the Catholic scripture. Finally, the very title page of the work now edited, is changed, cum suppressione veri et insinuatione falsi, All mention of the English College of Rheims, the translators, and of Bishop Challoner, the revisor, is suppressed, because the names of these Catholic champions is grating to the ears of the Protestant Biblemen; on the other hand, it is deceitfully insi nuated that Bishop Challoner's later edition of his Bible (which is more copious in its notes,) was not publish ed by equal authority with his former edition of 1749; (now, I myself have a copy of his last edition, which I received from that venerable personages own hand) and it is most falsely published that the present edition, containing all the numerous and im portant changes mentioned above, is 66 Your correspondent next informs us that the text of the stereotype Board edition is Bishop Challoner's, as are some of the notes, (being such, no doubt, as it is known Mr. Blair and Co. will by no means object to) but that other notes are altered, and very many totally omitted. He signifies an intention of furnishing, us stereotyped from the edition of with the particulars of the alterations 1749." The proper title, Mr. Ediand omissions, which I dare say, will tor, of this garbled work should be be found to be too exactly, the pas- A Liberal and Gentlemanlike Edition sages in Bishop Challoner's notes, of the New Testament in English, which have been censured by Blair for enlightening the Catholic Poor, to and Co. in their book of Correspon-frame their own Religion by the bare dence. In the mean time, we are text of it, published at the desire of assured that the following ungentle certain Protestant Biblemen, by——. manlike words, sects, heresies, here- Here, Mr. Editor, you see that I am tics, Protestant corruptions, are ut- at a loss, and so I must remain, til! terly discarded from the present po- some one or more individuals shall lite stereotype edition, in conformity come forward with their names to with Mr. Butler's promises, and the father this spurious bantling. If Mr. resolution of the Board, May, 11, Blair and Co. will own the work, I 1813; and also because it is presumed have nothing to say, they would act that no such naughty things as these in character; but should I be told exist in our days of light and libera-that it is the production of Catholic lity. Again, as the ignorant Catholic is deprived, in the new edition, of those invaluable sea marks which the Douay divines, and Bishop Challoner had furnished in the notes of their editions, to prevent his splitting on false translations and heterodox intering of our predecessors had provided pretations, so, it seems, he is robbed of that luminous beacon, which pointed to him the several passages of the scripture necessary for guarding and proving the different articles of his hands, I would confidently ask who it is that has ventured to do such unwarrantable and dangerous things? Who it is that has industriously destroyed the several buoys and lighthouses, which the zeal and learn for guiding ignorant Catholics in their intricate and perilous voyage through the sacred text? To conclude, it is not to be doubted that our Prelates, who are divinely commissioned to preserve the deposit of the word of pray the stereotype Testament is adopted by the pedagogue in question? And whether Mr. Charles Butler continues to subscribe his two guineas annually for supporting this New Protestant Charter School? For the Orthodox Journal. A. D. M. G. rations, a Knox, a. Voltaire, a Napo leon, &c. are found deserving of the highest commendation, and have their principles abetted and supported. I have followed these reviewers with tediousness and disgust, in their invec tives against the Holy Fathers of the Church. Argument I have found none in support of these invectives; not even the shadow of argument. Indig nant at the gross slanders dissemiDated by these writers, I have undertaken the task of wiping off the foul stain, conscious of meeting support and encouragement from one, who has so much signalized himself in the cause of truth and religion. I beg, Sir, that you will allow this hasty production a place in your excellent Journal, if not prevented by more important matfer. To detect and answer the gross and malicious misrepresentations (for I cannot impute them to ignoranee) with which almost every sentence abounds, will not be a difficult, though long and irksome task; as it unavoidably requires more leisure and pains to refate than to advance calumnies. Whoever may be the author of the article in question, he is not even entitled to the paltry merit of originality in his invec tives. The whole is but a bare repe tition of the slanders that have been so often urged by Dissenters of every description, and as often refuted. I MR. EDITOR,It is some time shall select a few of the most promisince an article appeared in the Edin-nent for examination, and if during burgh Review, No. 47, aspersing the the course of it, the subject should morals, impunging the doctrines, and compel me to make use of words or seeking to cast odium on the me- expressions, or to relate facts not mory, of the Holy Fathers. I trust quite consistent with the strictest prothat these characters of antiquity are priety, I trust that I shall meet with too well founded in the estimation indulgence from your readers, in conof your readers, to be blasted by sequence of the necessity to which I am the chilling breath of the North reduced. In his charges against these was shocked to see these self-con extraordinary men, the reviewer has stituted reviewers arraign before their neither observed order or method. For tribunal persons, who, for ages the sake of brevity, and the better been respected and revered, and intelligence of your readers, I shall drag then into notice, for the pur- reduce them principally under the pose of aspersion and calumny; while three following heads; viz. 1. Of Imthe most abandoned. characters of morality and Falsehood. 2. Of Ex--modern days, men justly doomed to travagant and Erroneous Doctrines. the execration of succeeding gene And 3. Of Ignorance. In the course: of the article he has interspersed sal- even the Pagans themselves, the avowlies of wit and sarcasm, and that freed enemies of Christianity, ever watchquently not of the happiest nature. ful to seize the slightest occasion, to These also I shall occasionally notice. accuse them of real or forged crimes, But before I professedly enter upon were compelled in this instance to sub❤ the subject, it will not be improper to mit to the force of truth, and bear state what respect and deference is testimony to their immaculate morals. commonly paid by Catholics to the Since the earliest ages of the revealed testimony of the Fathers. religion of the many heretics that have arisen, and proved themselves the constant and implacable enemies of the Fathers of the Church, though they have accused them in every other point, not one has ever been so bold as to attack them in matter of purity. At least I can testify (and I pretend to some little acquaintance with the subject) that I have never met with so much as a solitary instance. No, this was justly reserved for the chaste and enlightened reviewer of the present day; but even he, has been peculiarly unfortunate in the selection of the objects of his accusation. What could have been more ill-judged, more imprudent, than to impute a crime so odious, to one, whose death on the evidence of Eusebius, was principally occasioned by his zeal for the contrary virtue? According to this historian, the two chief informers against St. Justin were, Crescens the Cynic, whom the saint had reproached with the irregularity of his life, and another Pa Catholics then do not maintain each individual Father, or several of them together, to be infallible; on the contrary, we admit that they not only were liable to err, but also that almost all of them, separately taken, did actually err, in some point or other of faith | or discipline. We say, however, that when a majority of Fathers, of differeut ages, countries and dispositions, are unanimous in the assertion of any question of faith or discipline, in such cases, we say, their testimony is unquestionable. Nor do we fear the reproach of credibility, since this our belief is founded upon as great a moral certitude as human means can afford. Still more as they thus testify what was in their respective ages, the faith of the infallible Church. In confirmation of this opinion, we hesitate not to defy our adversaries, to shew even a single instance in which a majority of the Fathers have sanctioned any error whatsoever. After this declaration, I proceed in the order al-gan, whose wife he had converted and ready specified. I have said, that the dissuaded from consenting to the unauthor cannot pride himself on the natural demands of her husband. To merit of originality; but this (I wish one again, who, from a proud philosoit to be understood) is not altogether pher, was transformed into an humble accurate. One of his charges, and follower of a crucified God, by the that of the foulest and most malicious purity of morals and invincible counature, is certainly his own. The dis- rage, which he beheld in the first covery of this was reserved for the Christians? Yet such were the mosingular sagacity and penetration of tives that wrought his conversion, as our Northern reviewer; I allude to the saint himself tells us in his second the charge of immorality. This he Apology. But we cease to wonder particularly insinuates against St. Jus-that he should have charged a martyr tin, Origen, Tertullian, St. Jerome, of chastity, a learned and intrepid and St. Augustin. Nothing, I confess, apologist of the faith of Christ, with ever filled me with such surprise and this vice, w en he has affixed the same astonishment as this unexpected impu-to Origen, whose horror of it actuated tation. So remarkable was the chas--him to a deed, that even his best adtity of the primitive Christians in ge-mirers cannot but censure, that noneral, still more of their pastors, that thing but the purity of his motive ORTHOD. JOUR, VOL. IV. P could have excuse from sin; to a deed, in fine, that rendered it impossible for him to be guilty, saving in thought and desire. That Origen did this, is too notorious to be called in question, too well known to have been concealed from the reviewer. In refutation of his charge against Tertullian, it will suffice to say, that the abomination in which the latter held it, was such, as to consider it more heinous than apostacy from faith. It even hurried him into error, by his teaching this crime to be irremissable, and to exceed the powers given to the Church by Christ for the remission of sin. That the imputation is not wholly new with regard to St. Jerome, I readily admit. Even during the life of the saint, he was accused of too great intimacy with the religious females, whose instruction and direction he had, undertaken He was accused, I say, but by men, whose well-known characters were a sufficient vindication of the saint. These were some of the Roman clergy, who lived in a state of concubinage; worthy rivals, undoubtedly, of our reviewer in the cause of chastity. After the example of the great Apostle of the Gentiles, St. Jerome daily "sought to chastise his flesh, and reduce it into subjection." (1 Cor. ix. 27.) His whole time was devoted to the exercise of prayer, mortification, and the most unremitted and laborious studies. His life is represented by all the bistorians of the time, as a continual martyrdom of penance and incessant application. Your readers will judge, whether these are convincing tokens of a mind addicted to softness and pleasure. What we have said of St. Jerome, is equally applicable to St. Augustin, after his conversion. farther, he tells us, "that to the sanc tity of their subjects, they owe much of that imposing effect, which they have produced upon the minds of their readers." Now, who ever heard, that men of abandoned morals, were eminent men, men of sanctified lives, men addicted to laborious lucubra. tions, and that on serious and saintly subjects? I know not what the author may think, but for my part, I consider it a palpable self-contradiction. He tells us moreover in his first sentence, that "though admirable martyrs and saints, they were, after all, but indifferent Christians." Whatever deep and mysterious meaning these words (to me perfectly unintelligible) may contain, they appear to have been inserted with no other view, than that of biasing the judgment of the reader, and of obliterating in his eyes, the fair fame of these champions of the faith. Оп To substantiate his charge, I suppose of incontinency, the reviewer next alledges the belief of a Millennium, or temporal reign of Christ, during which the faithful are to be indulged in every sensual gratification. This error he particularly ascribes to St. Justin, and St. Irenæus, which, (if we believe the reviewer) "they gathered from the rank soil of oriental fanaticism." this point also his statement is incorrect; but whether through malice or ignorance, I pretend not to affirm. In proof thereof, I observe, that there were two species of Millenarians. Cerinthus, a Platonic philosopher, the founder of one of these sects, taught that at the end of the world, Jesus Christ would return upon the earth, and would reign for 1000 years over the just. That during this period the just would experience every sensual I cannot refrain from expressing delight, in compensation of their past my astonishment at the extraordinary labours and sufferings. That the Fa dullness of the author's memory. In thers embraced this opinion, is false; his first sentence, he stiles the Fa-o on the contrary they deemed it herethers, "eminent men, men of sancti-tical. For this reason several refied lives, men of laborious lucubrations, zealous and intrepid in the cause of the church." Three pages fused for a time, to insert the Apoca lypse among the inspired writings, regarding Cerinthus as the real author, who had affixed to it the name of St. John, the more easily to give credit to his error. The second class, of which Papias, Bishop of Hierapolis and disciple of St. John, passes for the author, believed that the just would reign for a 1000 years with Jesus Christ upon the earth, and would enjoy a spiritual rather than corporeal felicity; they positively disavowed all sensual gratifications. The latter error, it is true, both St. Justin, and St. Irenæus adopted, which they conceived to be expressed in the 20th chapter of the Apocalypse. I must in addition remark, that this latter opinion was not considered of faith. St. Justin in his dialogue with Try-condescended to adore the stones and phon, formally declares that many pious Christians did not believe in this Millinneum. *-2d. That it was therefore held by some of the Fathers, because they considered it as necessarily united with the dogma of faith in the general resurrection; and it is worthy of observation, that the heretics who rejected the one, denied also the other. +-3d. That this error was far from being common among the holy Fathers; Origen, his disciple Denys of Alexandria, Cauis, priest of Rome, St. Jerome, and others, treated it as a fable, and used their utmost exertions towards its extirpation. induced to listen to Christ, at the words of the woman of that city, with whom our Lord conversed at the fountain of Jacob. The conver sion of St. Augustin, that ornament and support of the church is, in a great measure, to be attributed to the incessant prayers and entreaties of his pious mother, St Monica. We truly find a strong proof of the divinity of our religion, in the sincere piety of these weak and tender, converts, when we consider that Cicero and the other boasted Pagan philosophers, though they admitted the unity of God in private, dared not publicly to avow their belief; but pitifully statues of their countrymen. Probably the Reviewer was not aware that his assertion was founded on such just grounds; but how much will his esteem and veneration for the sex be increased, from the consideration of the more peculiar advantages, which they have conferred on the Reformed Religion. When Luther, the 5th Evangelist, as he is pompously styled, began his holy reformation, and so powerfully addressed to the passions of his auditors the celebrated words, "in-. crease and multiply is not a precept, bnt more thau a precept; i. e. a divine work, which is as necessary as to be The Fathers, continues our Re- a man, and more necessary than to viewer, received the warmest and best eat, drink, sleep, or wake," then it assistance from their fair and enwas, the proper influence of the sex thusiastic female converts, and Chris- was duly appreciated. His own extianity itself is signally indebted to ample in breaking through his sacred. the latter for the impressions it pro- obligations and engagements to Alduced in these primitive ages. Though mighty God, and the wonderful hap I cannot concur with the author, in piness which he experienced in the his base insinuations against the Fa- society of his beloved Kate Boren, thers, I feel at least gratified, in our soon induced multitudes of monks mutual agreement, with respect to the and Nuns, galled with the yoke of blessings which Christianity in gene-religion, and insensible to the spirit ral has derived from the piety of the of their holy calling, to follow his female sex. I will even charitably footsteps. Add to this, the great assist him with a few proofs of his effects which this truly edifying interassertion. We read in the Gospel of course produced on the mind of LuSt. John, that the Samaritans were ther. The charms of liberty, and a See Luth. serm. de Mat. tom. 5. fol. |