this occasion? If not, surely it must require more than common skill in casuistry to explain, how that conduct can be unbecoming in the clergy, which is not so in their lay-brethren. I am persuaded likewise that the petitions of the clergy will appear to have been universally drawn up with studied candour, moderation, and tenderness, towards their Popish fellow subjects.

Denying then, as I do, and I trust upon good grounds, that there was any thing wrong or unbecoming in the interference of the clergy; I will go further and say, that I think it was their duty to do so. The clergy, Sir, are bound by their oaths and subscriptions to maintain and uphold the Protestant Establishment; to their care is committed "the ark of the covenant," "the church of the living God;" they know and feel it to be their duty to defend their Zion, more particularly from the attacks of a tyrannical and intolerant church, from which, nearly 300 years ago, they came out and were separated on the best and most tenable grounds. Con vinced then, as most assuredly they are, of the dangers to be apprehended from the unrestricted admission of the members of that idolatrous church to places of power and authority, they are bound in conscience to use every proper means to repel them. They conceive it to be their boun den duty to act as they have done. And they conceive that their conduct would have been highly censurable, had they shrunk from that duty in compliment to the opinion of any individual, however exalted his station in the established church, however amiable his cha racter in private life, Placed likewise, as they are, like a light upon a hill, it is a further branch of their duty to warn their flocks against the errors, corruptions, and divided allegiance, of that church from which they are separated, and to point out to them the dangers of which they them selves are so fully aware, and from which they have so much to apprehend. They understand full well, that if once the church of Rome should obtain an ascendancy, and secure a re-establishment in this country, no indulgence even of toleration would be permitted to the Protestant church. And why? Because the true Romish churchman conceives our church to be merely the work and institution of man, and our orders of clergy to have no derivation or succession from the apostles ;-at the same time he maintains his own to be wholly divine, and the only true church; conse quently, that our church is not the church of Christ, and therefore ought to be abolished.

1

The Right Rev. Prelate, however, may possibly entertain a different opinion on this subject. Eminently gifted as he is with liberality, candour, and tolerance, he may perhaps have formed an estimate of those qualities in others from the standard existing in his own mind. He may

possibly persuade himself that the Roman Catholics, having once obtained power and establishment, would be content to give stability and security to the Protestant church. Such a notion, however, the experience of a few years has fully refuted. Even in their present state of restriction and disqualification, and when they are straining every nerve to gain the ascendant, they will enter into no such engagement, they will make no such compromise. The Roman Catholics, it is well known, are dis. tinguished into two classes; one may be styled the staunch, the other, the moderate party.* Their transactions in the year 1789 are still fresh in the memory. In that year, the principal Roman Catholics made and subscribed a solemn declaration and protestation, disclaiming the following dangerous tenets: 1. That princes excommunicated by the Pope, may be deposed or murdered by their subjects. 2. That implicit obedience is du from Roman Catholics to the decrees of Popes and Councils, commanding them to take up arms against government, or to subvert the laws and li berties of their country, or to exterminate persons of a different persuasion for the good of the church. 3. That the Pope can dispense with any oath taken by a Catholic; and therefore that no oath of allegiance can bind them to any government. 4. That the Pope, or a Catholic priest, can pardon perjury, rebellion, and high treason, 5. That faith is not to be kept with heretics. This renunciation was signed by four apostolic vicars, by above 200 clergy, and by the principal Catholic laity in Eng. land; and yet, strauge to say, when afterwards a bill was drawn up, to be presented to Parliament, containing an oath of allegiance, in perfect conformity with the foregoing protestation, these same vicars apostolic, having, in the mean time, consulted the see of Rome, and the Roman Catholic bishops of Ireland and Scotland, not only refused to take the oath themselves, but forbade all persons under their jurisdiction to take it t: Not less memorable was the conduct of the Romish hierarchy in regard to the Veto. They had fully empowered their Right Rev. representative (Dr. Milner) to agree, on their parts, to the proposed measure; in con sequence of which, two noble Peers (the Duke of Norfolk and Lord Grenville), and two honourable Commoners (Messrs. Ponsonby and Grattan), advocated their cause in Parliament. They afterwards found that they had gone too far. They therefore retracted their concession, refused to allow their heretical yet lawful king any interference in the appointment of their bishops; in consequence of which, it was very ha turally concluded that the said peers and commoners would have with

and

We denominated them "the thorough-paced and mitigated Papists," in our list num ber, p. 232; we are happy that our Correspondent agrees with us in set ments.-Edit. See the Declaration and Protestation of the Roman Catholics of England, published by Stockdale. See also the Protestant Advocate, p. 132, 254, &c.

drawn their support. After such instances of duplicity, can any confidence be reposed in their allegiance to a Protestant sovereign, or their toleration of a Protestant church? I never indeed attached much importance to the Veto; conceiving it to be a measure very unlikely to be productive of security to the Protestant establishment. It has, however, been attended with one beneficial effect; it has proved, incontrovertibly, the intolerance of a church, which will make no concession, not even the smallest sacrifice, at the very time its members are preferring claims and petitioning for, or rather demanding, 'privileges of the highest importance, and such as no limited government can, with safety, confer on subjects whose tenets are at variance with the established religion, and whose allegiance is divided between two sovereigns.

Convinced as they are of these truths, conscious of the importance of the trust committed to their charge, and awake to the calls of duty, can it be deemed fit and becoming in the Protestant clergy to keep silent on the occasion, and to suppress their sentiments? Are they to be told, that it would better become them not to interfere at all, and not to give the example of petitioning to their lay-brethren? Surely they are as much concerned in the important question, and have as much at stake, as the laity. But whether they do or do not lift up their voice, the laity, it seems, are not the less disposed to make their voice to be heard; and if it be al lowable and right for the clergy to declare their sentiments, can it be done in a more proper way, or indeed in any other way, than the usual and Constitutional mode of petitioning the legislature? They know it to be their right, and they feel it to be their duty.

I remain, Sir, your obedient servant,

Feb. 10, 1813.

CLERICUS ANGLICANUS.

DISINGENUOUSNESS OF MR. GANDOLPHY.

Mr. EDITOR,-Through the medium of your excellent miscellany, I would beg leave to expose one of the most gross and shameful misrepre sentations that was, perhaps, ever made of the sentiments of one man by the perversions of another. It is somewhat more than a year ago since a sermon was published, entituled, " The Crisis of Religion, containing Stric tures on Mr. Lancaster's System of Popular Education." Amongst other observations tending to evince the dangers of this plausible but dangerous experiment, the author asserted, that the Bible was put into the hands of their pupils without creed or catechism, or commentary, leaving them to form their own selection of doctrines. "How little such a vagrant introduction," he adds, "is fitted to advance the interests of real and practical Christianity, I would leave to the common sense of every man to deter

mine; to me it appears to be the readiest and shortest of all methods to form sceptics and infidels. It is, in truth, no other than the vain delusions of Rousseau reduced to practice. This philosopher, in his utter detestation of prejudice, thought it best to leave his imaginary pupils to themselves to let them grope after wisdom, uninfluenced by paternal solicitude, and undirected by hereditary information. But it was soon discovered that a savage-not a sage-would be the result of this absence of preju dice'; and that a few years must convince the public, that any thing but a Christian may be formed from this wild and unbottomed scheme of in

struction."*

Judge what must have been the author's surprise and indignation when he found, that a Romish Priest had construed these very expressions into an acknowledgement of the insufficiency of the Bible as a rule of faith! Mr. Gandolphy has been pleased to cite the above extract from a sermon, as he says "of a distinguished Protestant Preacher," to prove that many of the more enlightened Protestants" have reversed their principles, and resumed that to which they had objected in the Catholic Church!" I would leave you to judge, Mr. Editor, whether a writer who can thus unblushingly pervert the sentiments of a cotemporary, is worthy of the smallest credit when he cites the opinions of those authors who, now removed to another and a better world, cannot answer for themselves.

But Mr. Gandolphy is not content with mere perversions-be condescends to mutilate the pages of another, to make them speak his own language. "If then," says the author at p. 18, "we are not prepared to sign our total apostacy from the sentiments and principles of the reformers, if we are not ashamed to confess ourselves, the descendants of those who died to ratify the truth, we shall pause, ere we give our assent to any sys tem which would omit them as superfluous- to a system which, under the pretended garb of Christianity, could only introduce a mere palatable species of infidelity and scepticism."

Now, Mr. Editor, all the first part of this period is entirely left out in Mr. Gandolphy's quotations, and you read it thus-" It is a system which under the pretended garb, &c."

**After this he garbles some expressions from page 20 of the same sermon, separating them from the context, in which they bear exclusively on Mr. Lancaster's mode of instruction, and applying them to the Bible, with this concluding reflection of his own." Surely then an instrument so destructive is ill calculated to build with."

I need not inform you, Sir, that if this kind of persuasion should be

See his Sermon inseribed to Dr. Marsh, pp. 55. 6. 7.

eome general, the Bible itself may be turned into blasphemy, and every man may be made to belie his own opinions. At the very time that Mr. Gandolphy was complimenting the author of this sermon, as ranking with "those enlightened Protestants" who were resuming the principles of Papists, he was actually employed in preaching a course of sermons on the errors and impositions of the Romish Church. Anxious for no ambiguous praises of liberality, he is happy to tread in the principles of the reformers, and lays claim to no other title than that of

Bath, Feb. 5. 1813.

AN "UN"DISTINGUISHED PROTESTANT PREACHER.

*** The Crisis of Religion, &c. a sermon, was published by the Rev. E.. W. Grinfield, M. A. Minister of Laura Chapel, Bath.-Another sermon by the same author, under the title of "An Address to Protestants on the Necessity of securing the Advantages by maintaining the Spirit of the Reformation," has just reached us. We have read it with great satisfaction; it is well calculated to support the Protestant cause; and cannot but do good. The text is, "What I say unto you, I say unto all-watch." 13. Mark 37. We hope very soon to notice Mr. Gandolphy's letter to Dr. Marsh, &c.

To the Editor of the Protestant Advocate.

SIR,-As you have done me the honor to insert in your second number the few observations I communicated to you, I cannot do less than to thank you for introducing me into such good company, whose meritorious efforts have adorned your pages, far beyond my humble powers to accomplish. However, as I am animated with the consideration, that every particle of evidence ought to be produced at the moment of trial, in order to support a good cause, and to oppose a bad one, I have presumed once more to send you a fresh testimony of my zeal and consistency on this im portant occasion, indulging the hope that it may contribute in some degree to promote a good cause. I will endeavour, then, as coolly and dispassionately as possible, to estimate the probable consequences that may ar rise to Protestants, should, what the Papists call, Catbolic Emancipation take place. It is an old observation, that what has been once done, may be done again. And, therefore, we may ask, if full liberty of action be given to the Papists, will their conduct, at present, prove different from that adopted by their forefathers? Alas! Sir, when we recollect that it is an unquestionable article in the Catholic Creed, that no faith need be kept