wearing the garb of ministers of God, who give utterance to the implied aspersion, that during the first fifteen hundred years all the females, and during the last three centuries, two thirds of the females of Christendom, were and are immoral and corrupt? That this corruption has pervaded all classes from the princess to the peasant girl, and that the only means to guard against it is to abolish Confession altogether? Gracious God! upon what times have we fallen! When what is selfstyled pure and evangelical religion can be sustained only by such foul imputations on the great body of Christians; when the country is inundated with filth, in order to create and keep up this impression; when Reverend preachers lend their name and influence to such pollution ; can we wonder at the wide-spread infidelity and corruption of morals so apparent in the rising generation? Can we marvel that, from the official statement of the American Almanac, more than half of our adult population over twenty-one years of age belongs to no religion whatever? If Christianity, in its oldest form, and as taught and practised by two-thirds of the Christian world even at the present enlightened day, in nations too the most polished and civilized, has produced, and still produces such fruits, can we wonder that men turn from it with disgust, and throw themselves into the swelling ranks of infidelity? Can we be surprised at this result, when the works of such infidels as Michelet are circulated, by authority, among our population, as excellent and highly useful productions? 66 Tell us not, that the corrupting influences of the Confessional have been conclusively established by published extracts from our own accredited Such theologians, Dens, Liguori, and others. no-popery" champions as Sparry, the driveling apostate Smith, and many more of the same stamp, have indeed flooded our land with such publications, teeming with obscenity, said to be translated from our own authors; and Sparry, for acting as traveling pedler of such books, was arrested by the civil authorities in Pennsylvania. Our enemies are heartily welcome to all the laurels they have won in this campaign. They proved their own groveling impurity of mind and heart; they did not, because they could not, sully the lily-white purity of Catholicity. Their false and garbled extracts. showed only their own dishonesty and baseness. By precisely the same process of collecting and publishing in a body disjointed fragments, according to a pre-conceived theory, one might that the studies of law and of medicine are immoral in their prove tendency, and should be wholly abolished; and that even the sacred and inspired Scriptures of God teem with impurity, and are corrupting in their influence! Do not those men know, that there are in the studies of medicine and law, many very plain details on certain delicate subjects, which should not be spread out for general reading, but which, in the connection in which they stand, are highly useful, if not indispensably necessary? Do they not know that those works are strictly professional, and as such not at all blame-worthy? And why will they not have the candor and honesty, to make the same allowance in regard to Catholic theological works, written in Latin, withdrawn by this circumstance and by their very nature from the popular gaze, and strictly professional in their character and tendency? Or is it proper to enter into those details in English,-a language accessible to all,- for the purpose of unfolding human laws, and treating the ills of the body, and not proper to do the same in Latin,—a language hidden from the multitude,for the much higher and nobler purpose of developing the divine law, and unfolding the necessary remedies for the maladies of the soul? Do not the holy Scriptures themselves furnish us with a precedent for this? Are there not many chapters in the Bible which a pure-minded female would not venture to read aloud in company? And is the Bible corrupt for this? What would be thought of another Sparry or Smith, who should be at the pains of collecting together and publishing in one volume, with a running commentary, all those Scriptural extracts, for the purpose of establishing the immorality of the Bible? And what are we to think of the men who have republished and who circulate with zealous commendation the thoroughly infamous book of Michelet, in which the foul infidel more than intimates that the Canticle of Canticles, or Song of Solomon, is little more than a mere love song breathing, in "burning language,' "the sentiments of a carnal affection; and who tries to prove that the great Bossuet was a carnal-minded and corrupt man, because in his correspondence with Madam Cornuan, he employs and comments upon the language of that Canticle? Out upon such pretended delicacy, and real hypocrisy! One feels almost tempted to exclaim with Shakspeare: Now step I forth to whip hypocrisy." The real secret of all this clamor against the Confessional is found in the simple fact, that Confession is very hard to flesh and blood, and exceedingly humbling to human pride. It is very painful, to feel compelled to reveal our wickedness to a fellow-creature as sinful as ourselves. But this very feature of Confession is, perhaps, the strongest proof of its divine origin. Christianity in its very nature wars against flesh and blood, and inculcates self-denial and humility. The practice of Confession is highly calculated to keep alive this feeling. How is it possible that man would and could ever have introduced a doctrine so very painful? How is it possible that mankind could have been persuaded to adopt a practice so very humbling, unless they firmly believed that Christ himself had enjoined it as a command, and as an essential condition for obtaining pardon of sin? Whoever knows anything of human nature, knows that, however easy it may be to introduce changes for the worse, 1 Page 96, seq. In a long note, the author furnishes us with extracts from Bossuet's correspon dence, in which the expressions he (Michelet) reprobates most, are precisely those of the divine Spouse of the Canticles! Where spiritual love alone is indicated, accompanied by spiritual union with the divine Spouse, he can understand nothing but mere carnal love! He attempts to prove that Bossuet. the great adversary of even the most mitigated form of Quietism, was in reality a Quietist himself, merely because he wrote this commentary on the Canticle of Canticles! The beautiful devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus he perverts in the same vile way. (Page 112, seqq.) These are pretty fair specimens of his mind and heart, and of his reasoning. it is utterly impossible to persuade men to change for the better, without a clear divine warrant and sanction. We venture to say, that all the preachers of all the jarring sects in Christendom together would not be able, by joint combination and effort, to introduce any such change, or to persuade even a dozen of their respective flocks to resort to Confession. But again if the priests introduced Confession, why did they not take the prudent precaution to exempt themselves from its obligation? Why do priests, bishops, and Popes still hold themselves divinely bound to practise this humbling observance? What possible motive could have induced them to enjoin Confession for the first time? Was it, that they might impose on themselves a new burden, much more painful than any other in the whole ministry,—a burden which weighs down their energies, engrosses so much of their time, taxes so heavily their patience, and withal presents not one worldly inducement to continue its laborious ministrations? Do men usually act, not only without an adequate motive, but even against all motives of self-interest? Finally, if the priests introduced Confession, when did they do it; under what circumstances; how did they succeed in persuading mankind to adopt the observance; who first taught the doctrine; who opposed its introduction? These questions have been often asked; they have never been answered. History says nothing whatever on all those important circumstances, and yet they would have been carefully recorded, had any innovation of the kind been attempted. All Christendom would have cried out against a change so painful to nature; and history would have re-echoed the voice of the indignant protest, which would have gone forth. Such was invariably the case in regard to attempted innova tions of much less practical importance. We have now done with Michelet and his loathsome book. We have devoted to it more space than it deserved; but we have done it, because the work has appeared in this country under Protestant auspices, as an element in the bitter and most unscrupulous warfare now waged against Catholicity in this free republic. We have employed strong language, but not half so strong as the book and the author merited. If the preachers who lead the anti-Catholic crusade will be caught in such company, if they will use means so thoroughly vile to promote their objects, can they complain that they should be denounced in strong language? For the great body of the people, misled by their artifices, we have no words of harshness; we have but tears of compassion to drop over their cruel condition in having such leaders. The meek and humble Saviour strongly and severely rebuked the ancient Pharisees, out of compassion for the victims of their hypocrisy; we have but sought to aim at the imitation of His example. |