252 SUPREMACY IN AMERICA IS THE DESIGN OF POPERY. ters the apparently unaffected kindness, and anxious, disinterested care of the holy fathers, meanwhile blended with an air of mystery and authority, combined with the attractive charms in which their religion is presented to the eye and ear, can not fail to awaken peculiar interest in the susceptible minds of the young, and steal away their hearts. Politics is another means employed by the catholics to obtain power and ascendency in this country. I state this as a Christian minister, not as a partisan, for all parties are the same to me—all are influenced by the same motivesand acting to the same end. The church of Rome is bent on obtaining the ascendency in our republic, and after two or three more millions of her faithful adherents have arrived from the pope's dominions, she will feel independent of either party, and do as a certain conjuror is represented to have done. To accomplish the destruction of a formidable castle, he summoned certain demons and spirits of the deep, and said to them: "Gentlemen, that castle is an eyesore to me, I wish to level it to the ground; will you assist me?"-"Oh yes, to be sure we will, with all our hearts," they replied. They accordingly helped him pull down the castle, but just as they came to a hidden treasure, the conjurer said: "Now, gentlemen demons, I have accomplished my object, I have got the treasure I sought for, I pray you will retire to your own place, and leave me to help myself."—"Not so," said they, "we helped to achieve the victory, and we mean to share in the spoils." So will it be in the present To effect her object, popery assists, alternately, both the great parties, and when she has attained the object of her ambition, she will say: "Gentlemen, you may retire, and leave me to enjoy the spoils." Depend upon it, my brethren, the time is not far distant, when protestants, men of all parties, will be compelled to unite, to defeat the designs of Rome, and save our republic from her fell grasp. case. To establish her supremacy, the church of Rome is constantly receiving large contributions from abroad. During the year 1839, the papists received $160,000—in 1840, $163,000-in 1842, $177,000-in 1843, 175,000-in 1844, $150,000 in 1845, $160,000-in 1846, $250,000. Since the year 1839, an average of nearly $200,000 has been annually re SUPREMACY IN AMERICA IS THE DESIGN OF POPERY. 253 ceived in this country, for the spread of papacy. It is evident a foreign conspiracy has been formed against the political and religious institutions of the United States. To accomplish her ambitious designs, the church of Rome proscribes the common use of the Bible. It is the right, duty, and privilege, of all to read the Bible. It is the revelation God has given, and the only one for the instruc tion and salvation of man, hence the Savior himself commands us to" search the Scriptures." What are the views of the Romish church on this point? What is the language of the popes and councils? Pope Leo XII., in his letter addressed to all the bishops of the Romish church, dated at Rome so late as the third day of May, 1824, thus writes: "You are aware, venerable brethren, that a certain society called the Bible society, strolls with effrontery through the world; which society, contemns the traditions of the holy fathers, and contrary to the well-known decree of the council of Trent, in Rule IV., which says, 'If the Bible be translated indiscriminately, and allowed to all, it will cause more evil than good."" Pope Leo XII., in his letter gravely tells us from St. Peter's chair, "They have turned the gospel into the gospel of devils." Pope Pius VII., in his letter of 1816, denounced bible societies as a pestilence." The earliest severities of the inquisition were directed to the Bible, and the edict of the council of Thoulouse 1229, forbade, the laity to read it in their own tongue. 66 In the year 1558, the terrible law of Philip II. was published, which decreed confiscation and death for all who should sell, keep, or read, any of the books prohibited by the holy office, among these the Bible was especially included. This law was sanctioned by the bull issued in 1559. Bishop Spotswood once said to Black Adder, he "would rather half of the people of the nation should be brought to the stake and burnt, than one man should read the Bible and form his judgment from its contents!" At the time Thomas Harding was found in the woods reading his bible, he was taken to the stake and burnt, and every one who carried a fagot to the stake was granted forty days' indulgence! The Rev. Mr. Winans, an Irish protestant, stated before the British bible society, that he employed four men to go out and expound the Scriptures in the bounds of his extensive congrega 254 SUPREMACY IN AMERICA IS THE DESIGN OF POPERY. tion; that three of them were murdered, and the fourth they killed before Mr. Winan's door, and as he lay weltering in his blood, his murderers turned and remarked: "Mr. Maker, you'll never expound the Scriptures again!" In the absence of his father, a little boy attended the sabbathschool of a Dutch reformed minister. On his return, he went up stairs, and finding his son reading the Word of God, he asked him, "What book are you reading?" He replied, "The Bible.”— "Where did you get it?"-"In yonder sabbath-school." He then took the Bible from him, and committed it to the flames, saying: "If you ever go to the sabbath-school again, I'll give you such a thrashing as you never had." Having ascertained that the bible was burnt, his son said to him: "Father, you've burnt my bible, but I can tell you what it is, you can not burn out of me those pretty little chapters I have committed to memory out of the gospel of St. John." A lady who had received a bible in one of our neighboring towns, was called on by a priest, who asked her if she kept a protestant bible in her house. "Yes," said she.-" Where is it?""On that shelf."-"Hand it to me."-"Help yourself, sir."— "Hand me that bible!" repeated the priest.-"You are big enough to help yourself." He seized the tongs, with which he took the bible, threw it out doors, and burnt it. Protestants go for a bible education an education based on the oracles of God. What education would that be, my friends, which would minister to all that is material and perishable in our nature, but would cast a dark and impenetrable shroud over all that is glorious and enduring in the prospect of regenerated humanity? What education would that be which would allow me to learn the name and smell the fragrance of every flower, but would conceal from my view the Rose of Sharon? What education would that be which would unfold the wonders of immensity, and allow me to gaze on every star that studs the canopy of heaven, but cast a dark mantle over the bright and morning star? What education would that be which would allow me to dip into all the rules of the pharmacopoeia, to learn its balms, and its cordials, but debar me from that only balm that comforts and quickens with a blessed immortality? To attain the object of her ambition the church of Rome proscribes liberty of conscience. SUPREMACY IN AMERICA IS THE DESIGN OF POPERY. 255 The denial of private judgment and liberty of conscience, is the greatest barrier to intellectual and moral progress. It paralyzes the mind, discourages every noble pursuit, and is destructive to national prosperity. It is despotism of the worst kind. A gentleman of our city, a few years ago, happened inadvertently to say to his father confessor, "I think sir, it is so and so." The priest kindled into a rage, and said: "You think, sir! what right have you to think? If ever I catch you thinking again, I'll place you under such a penance as will stop your thinking." What, we ask, is the whole edifice of popery, but a compound of pride, ambition, covetousness, and fraud? The officials of Rome have no other object in view but to promote their own secular interests, and rule our country with a rod of iron. My brethren, let your course ever be marked by candor and liberality, but never let us betray our civil and religious liberties into the hands of their bitterest enemies by giving them the sword of destruction, under the delusive plea that their principles are changed. In view of the foregoing statements, it may be asked by some, "What is the duty we owe to catholics?" It is obviously our duty to seek their conversion to God. Let it be ours to follow the noble example of Howard, who, when at Rome, had no time to inspect her temples and works of art, but found time to gaze at the captive in his cell, and bind up his broken heart; or the example of Paul, who, when on Mar's hill, found no time to contemplate the literature and splendors of learned Athens while his thoughts were occupied with the strange inscription on one of her Altars, to the "Unknown God." Neither the imposing grandeur of their cathedrals, the pomp and glitter of their worship, should be suffered to blind our minds to the moral state and prospects of the papists in our land, nor the tremendous power for evil, which, if unchecked, they are destined to exert upon our institutions. But we are told it is unkind, illiberal, and uncharitable, thus to raise a cry against popery, and do they think to silence us by this unfounded imputation? Shall the watchman hold his peace when he sees the sword coming? Let him do it at his peril. For one I glory in the office of lifting up my voice like a trumpet to cry, no popery! It is not in the spirit of unkindness, but as I love and value the dearest interests, the temporal and eternal welfare of papists, so I feel myself called on to raise and pro 256 SUPREMACY IN AMERICA IS THE DESIGN OF POPERY. long the cry no popery! If I could follow my heart wherever it could go, I would visit every spot where the deluded and enslaved Romanist is found, and there, as I value their freedom and salvation, would cry no popery! Yes, brethren, I would go into a Romish mass-house-I would enter the conclave of Romish bishops-I would go to the Vatican itself, the place of the man of sin-I would go into his dark and degrading confessional, where the poor papists trust their wives and daughters to him, while the tyrant presses his obscene and impure investigation, putting the heart and sensibility of the miserable creature on the rack till she sinks enslaved and powerless at his feet-yea, I would drag the victim forth in triumph from his grasp, and ring in the monster's ear no popery! The motto, then, of every protestant Christian, and of every true-hearted American, should be: "No peace with Rome, till Rome makes her peace with God." IR THE WARNING. "Come out of her, my people, that ye be not partakers of her sins, and that ye receive not of her plagues."-Rev. xvii. 4. "COME out of her," the mystic city seated "Come out of her,"-the sentence has been spoken, O, yes. No fading sunset-splendors, brightening THE END. |