it is damnable.

God forbid that I should think

it so! But how perilous it is to those who hold it, how injurious to religion, and consequently to society, shall presently be shown. Upon this opinion you and your selected authorities tell us one thing, and your Doctors and Saints and Breviaries tell us another. For Bonaventura is not the only Saint whom I can bring forward. St. Peter Damian (he too a Cardinal as well as a Saint) speaks of the blessed Virgin, when she intercedes for sinners, as not intreating, but commanding; as a Mistress, and not as a handmaid. Holy Church," says a book of English Roman Catholic devotions, frequently minds her of her Motherhood, and supplicates that she will be pleased to show that great authority wherewith this Title of Titles empowers her.

Monstra te esse Matrem!

Sumat per te preces,
Qui pro nobis natus

Tulit esse tuus,”

* Dr. Phillpotts has well observed, "it is worth remarking that, in this instance, an important change has been wrought in transferring the original hymn into your English books of devotion, in order to accommodate it to the feelings of those who live among Protestants. The turn given to it in the "Garden of the Soul," (p. 254.) is as follows:

Exert the mother's care

And us thy children own ;

What says the Patriarch of Constantinople,* St. Germanus? He says that the intercession of the Virgin is irrefragable, because of the invincible power which she possesses with her Son. What says St. Antonine of Florence? that Christ obeys her as his mother in Heaven, even as he did upon earth. Are men canonized, Sir, who teach what is damnable ? † Whom or which are we to receive as delivering the real opinion of the Romish Church,.. Mr. Gother, or St. Antonine? St. Peter Damian, or Dr. Challoner?.. Mr. Charles Butler, or Cardinal St. Bonaventura?.. The Breviary, or the Book of the Roman Catholic Church?... Be not offended, Sir! You have called upon me,‡ who had given you no cause for such a call, to compare myself "with Anselm in holiness, with

To him convey our prayer

Who chose to be thy Son.

Letters to Charles Butler, Esq. p. 48.

Whereas the meaning of the original, as truly given in the

older books, is,

Shew thyself to be a mother,

Let him through thee receive our prayers... (the imperative mood)

Who for our sakes submitted

To be born thy Son.

* Andrade, Patrocinio de N. Señora, tit. i. § ii. p. 493. + Ib.

+ Page 74.

Bede in hagiography, with the author of the Alexandreis in poetry, with Thomas Aquinas in theology, with Matthew Paris and Matthew of Westminster in history, and with Roger Bacon in philosophy!" There is cause for the comparison which I request you to make. For your opinion is at variance with Bonaventura's; for your book is contradicted by your Breviary. It is you, not I, who come under the provisions of the Butler-aboo statute.

Enough has been said to show that the Blessed Virgin is regarded as something more than a creature by Romish writers of the highest authority, and that she is called upon in the prayers of the Romish Church to exercise the authority of a Mother over her Son. But this part of my subject would be incomplete were I to leave it here.

Baronius touches very lightly upon the heresy of the Collyridians,* who fancied that the Blessed Virgin was of divine nature, impeccable, and immortal, and who worshipped her as a Goddess, offering in sacrifice upon her yearly festival, certain cakes, (xoλλugídas,) from which they derived their name, and of which they all partook. This superstition originated among some Thracian women, and is condemned by

* T. iv. 359. Bernino, i. 305.

Epiphanius in terms as strong as if he had foreseen the Hyperdulia which would one day be practised in the Romish Church. "Let Mary be held in honour," he says, "but let the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost, be worshipped; let no one worship Mary... Although Mary be most excellent, and holy, and to be honoured, yet is she not to be worshipped." And he called upon his contemporaries to put down with a manly mind the madness of these women, hoping, in his own words, to cut the roots of this idolatrous heresy.

Let us see whether opinions as extravagant as those of the Collyridians have not been advanced upon the same subject by names of high authority in the Romish Church; and whether ceremonies as idolatrous as that of consecrating cakes to her honour are not encouraged in that Church, and widely practised by its members at this day. What, Sir, will and of St. Ber

you say of St. Peter Damian,

nard, who both† maintain that to the Virgin all power in Heaven and Earth is given? What

* Ussher's Answer to a Challenge, 477.

† Data est tibi omnis potestas in cœlo et in terrâ.—Petr. Damian. Serm. i. de Nativ. B. Mar. t. v. Surii, Sept. 8. Quoted by Ussher, ut supra, p. 480.

Data est ei potestas in cælo et in terra, quæ posse potestas est. -S. Bernardini Opera. 1735. Super Salve Regina.

to St. Anselm,* who calls her the Empress of Heaven and Earth, and all that is therein? What to St. Bernardine de Sienna,† who says that all the gifts, graces, and virtues of the Holy Ghost, are by her hands administered to whom she pleaseth, when she pleaseth, how she pleaseth, and as much as she pleaseth; and this because she is the Mother of the Son from whom the Spirit proceedeth? What to the Patriarch St. Germanus, (still, Sir, they are your Saints whom I bring forward to prove your doctrine!) when he affirms that no one is forgiven, unless through her intercession; no one receives God's grace, unless through her mediation; no one is saved, unless through her help? What of Cassian, who asserts that the salvation of all mankind consists in the multitude of her favours? What of St. Fulgentius, when he tells us that neither Earth nor

* Andrade, ut supra, 538.

+ Et quia talis est Mater Filii Dei qui producit Spiritum Sanctum, ideò omnia dona, virtutes et gratiae ipsius Spiritus Sancti quibus vult, quando vult, quomodo vult, et quantum vult per manus ipsius administrantur.—Serm. Ixi. Artic. i. cap. viii. Ussher, ut supra, 479.

Jesus, Mary, Joseph, p. 52.

§ Ib. 54.

|| Cœlum et terra dudum fuissent si non Maria precibus sustentasset.-1. iv. Myst. Theol. Andrade, Patrocinio de N. Señora, p. 500.