of the fact that no church or creed can hold its ground in antagonism with science. Demonstration is not the basis of religious faith; but there can be no faith in that which is demonstrably false. The only faith that will endure is one that will coalesce easily and gladly with new truth; which fears neither science, nor history, nor criticism, but which welcomes every fresh discovery as so much new light thrown upon the ways and works of God.

Inevitable Decay of Catholicism.

The maintenance of the Roman Catholic creed in a consistent form is, amongst laymen, according to my observation, an exceptional thing. Catholic laymen rather avoid theorizing about their creed, having a feeling that it is not prudent to do so. If they once began to reason, doubt might occur, and when doubt begins there is no knowing where it may stop. Thus the tradition is kept unexamined, in the same wrappings of faith in which it has been received; and when, from habitual communication with Protestants, parts of it crumble away, the holders often become half-Protestant without knowing it, and without any uncomfortable feeling of inconsistency. Hence, in a perfectly free and friendly intercourse between Roman Catholics and Protestants, it seems to me inevitable that, as a general rule, the Roman Catholic religion must lose ground. That religion includes so many external observances, that the profession of it may remain, without any consciousness of insincerity, long after the belief has fallen away to a point which in the sixteenth century would have been thought worthy of the faggot. But wherever the two creeds intermingle, the whole atmosphere becomes Protestant. Catholicism can be kept in perfect preservation only in the cloister. Except in a few peculiarly-constituted minds, the theology of the middle ages will not blend with the large and active thought of modern times. The union may be accomplished and cemented artificially by the pressure of persecution. But in

this matter the fable of the traveller and his cloak is strictly to the point. There is nothing so dangerous to Catholicism as sunshine.

Hence it appears to me that the wit of man could not have devised anything more likely to be ultimately favourable to the Church of Rome in England, than the uproar which was made about the ecclesiastical titles. It was both a stimulus and an advertisement. To say nothing of its tendency to provoke in generous minds a reaction in favour of the weaker party, it could not but put all the Catholics on their mettle, and awaken attention everywhere to their claims. Now the English Roman Catholic laity are remarkably free from the propagandist spirit, and it was the worst possible policy to compel them, from a point of honour, to become zealous for the claims of their priesthood. The practical effect must be, that the ultramontane divines and the Oxford converts will be able henceforth to wield the whole influence of the Roman Catholic party, and to prevent every approach to union or compromise with Protestants in the all-important business of education.

In the United States, where the prelates of the Roman Catholic Church are allowed to adopt what titles and organization they please, there is much reason to believe that that church is losing ground. Bitter complaints have been made recently of the extent to which the Irish population in America, being there no longer tied to the ancient faith by the point of honour or by the identification of Protestantism with social hostility, has shaken off the yoke. This seems to me an inevitable result. For the Irish peasantry, though naturally fond of a formal and imposing worship, are also keen in seeing the weak points of the priesthood, much inclined to dabble in those very inquiries and controversies from which the educated Catholics stand aloof, and under favourable circumstances would be more likely than the English to get rid of a traditional error. If, instead of the system of persecution which began in Ireland at the Reformation, efficient schools had been generally established for instructing the people in their own language, and

the two races and churches had been then placed on a footing of legal and social equality, I have a most firm conviction, from much study of the history and character of the Irish people, that the adherents of the Roman Catholic Church amongst them at this day would be a very small minority.

Church of Rome in England.

Where such a view is entertained of the position and prospects of the Roman Catholic Church, of course there can be no participation in the fears entertained of its progress in this country. Single conversions may continue to be made, but the science, literature, pursuits, and character of the English people are all insuperable obstacles to the spread of such principles. Such gains as the Church of Rome has made are attributable to that isolation of thought on certain subjects which exists in England, and which rendered the latest and most refined form of Catholicism almost unknown here before the beginning of the Oxford movement. Young men, brought up in the popular and traditional notions respecting Popery, found, when they did inquire, that those notions were in many respects erroneous; and then there followed, as a natural result, an over-valuation of everything that had been before unduly depreciated. The friends of Protestantism should above all things try to ascertain what is going on in the minds of young men, and not seek to avoid danger by thrusting their own heads into the bushes. It appears to me to be in one important sense true, as was said by Mr. Martineau in the most able Essay' which the papal question called forth, that English theologians are not generally aware of the variety and strength of the Catholic resources. But there could be no worse mode of curing such a defect than legislation. It might have been left to the learning of

The "Battle of the Churches," in the Westminster Review, since reprinted with other Essays, every one of which is full of original thought, and distinguished by a style in which extreme metaphysical refinement is combined with the vividness of poetry.

Oxford and Cambridge to forge the new weapons requisite for the defence of the Reformation. But our wisdom has thought it better to entrust that cause to the vigilance of the common informer.

If we turn from the theological weaknesses to the practical working of this church, we see that, whatever be its errors, and whatever practices it may contain inconsistent with the general spirit of Christianity, it is still, as a whole, a portion of the general Christian counterpoise to that mass of selfishness and licentious passions which constitutes the real social danger of the time. So far it is not an evil, but a good. A pure form of Protestantism in its place would be better; but if, as is very likely, the driving away of Catholicism would not make something better to come in its place, the cause of pure morals would lose and not gain by the process. For I utterly reject, as false and slanderous, those foul imputations which are so often flung out against the Roman Catholic clergy of England and Ireland. If it be true, as every one who knows anything of Roman Catholic society in these countries must know it to be, that Roman Catholic women are as pure, and as much above suspicion, as any others, what is it but calumny to draw the inferences which are habitually drawn from what is to be found in the text-books? Those reckless and envenomed polemics are indeed a scandal to Christianity, and a mournful feature of the times.

The Irish People and their Priests.

There is a large Irish population in Great Britain, who will receive no religious ministrations except from Catholic priests. They may neglect those ministrations, or be deprived of them, but the result is not that they become Protestant, but that they become demoralized. This is a matter of fact which may be at any time verified by inquiring into the conduct of the Irish labouring population. But if it be so, then the labours of those priests against whom so many well-meaning persons are ready

to embark in any kind of crusade, are labours beneficial to the whole mass of society. This is true in England, but is still more true in Ireland. Neither angry polemics nor hostile legislation will bring any better moral influences to bear upon the Irish peasant than those which he derives through the Church of Rome. Consider, then, what must be the effect in that country of a systematic warfare upon an institution which has such deep root in the soil, while almost every other has been either blighted or pulled up. There is no doubt much in the demeanour of the Irish clergy to repel the English people, but the aspect which the Irish priest presents to England is his worst. Combative, perhaps, he is, and full of angry violence in his language; but see him amongst his flock, and you see another For them, he is the friend in perplexity-the protector in danger the pastor and consoler in sickness and desolation. On all the joyful and sorrowful occasions of life the priest and the people are together. Sympathy, sweet to all, but longed for even to weakness by the Irish, is found by the people in the priesthood, and is sought elsewhere in vain. Such is the class whom English statesmen at this crisis of European affairs think it wise to exasperate by insult. Such is the class whom others, in the name of interests far higher than those of policy, think it consistent with Christian prudence and Christian charity, even at this great exigency in the history of society, to cover with the most odious imputations.

man.

Comprehensiveness not Latitudinarian.

It does not involve, as to many it may appear to do, a lax or latitudinarian principle, to admit that the spirit of Christianity may work powerfully in connection with theological error. It does not lead to the conclusion that one iota of what is regarded as truth is to be surrendered or slighted, but merely that the energy of each Christian body should be turned against that mass of practical heathenism, the christianization of which, in the comprehensive view of Chalmers, seemed to