ROMAN CATHOLICISM.-BY DR. CHANNING. [The following article is extracted from a letter, by Dr. Channing, to the Rev. F. J. Clarke, Editor of the Western Messenger, Louisville, Kentucky. In the preceding portion of the letter, he congratulates Mr. Clarke on the field which he has chosen for his ministerial labours in the 'far west,' and dwells on the peculiar circumstances that favour his evangelizing work in that comparatively uncultivated district of the States. He then goes on to notice the prevalence of the Roman Catholic Faith in Kentucky; and in the portion of the letter which we extract, eloquently sets forth the great principles of our being, which must eventually destroy its power, both in the states and throughout the world.]

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I PASS now to another subject. We hear much of the Catholic religion in the West, and of its threatening progress. There are not a few here who look upon this alarm as a pious fraud, who consider the cry of no popery," as set up by a particular sect to attract to itself distinction and funds; but fear is so natural, and a panic spreads so easily, that I see no necessity of resorting to so unkind an explanation. It must be confessed, that Protestantism enters on the warfare with Popery under some disadvantages, and may be expected to betray some consciousness of weakness. Most Protestant sects are built on the Papal foundation. Their creeds and excommunications embody the grand idea of Infallibility as truly as the decrees of Trent, and the Vatican; and if the people must choose between different infallibilities, there is much to incline them to that of Rome. This has age, the majority of votes,

more daring assumption, and bolder denunciation on its side. The popes of our different sects are certainly less imposing to the imagination than the Pope at Rome.

I trust, however, that with these advantages, Catholicism is still not very formidable. It has something more to do, than to fight with sects; its great foe is the progress of society. The creation of dark times, it cannot stand before the light. In this country in particular, it finds no coadjutors in any circumstances, passions, or institutions. Catholicism is immoveable, and movement and innovation are the order of the day. It rejects the idea of melioration, and the passion for improvement is inflaming all minds. It takes its stand in the Past, and this generation are living in the Future. It clings to forms, which the mind has outgrown. It will not modify doctrines, in which the intelligence of the age cannot but recognise the stamp of former ignorance. It forbids free inquiry, and inquiry is the spirit of the age, the boldest inquiry, stopping nowhere, invading every region of thought. Catholicism wrests from the people the right to choose their own ministers, and the right of election is the very essence of our institutions. It establishes an aristocratical priesthood, and the whole people are steeped in republicanism. It withholds the Scriptures, and the age is a reading one, and reads the more what is forbidden. Catholicism cannot comprehend that the past is not the present; cannot comprehend the revolution which the art of printing, and the revival of learning have effected. Its memory seems not to come down lower than the middle ages. It aims to impose restraints on thought, which were comparatively easy before the press was set in motion, and labours to shore up institutions, in utter unconsciousness, that the state of society and the modes of thinking on which they rested, have passed

away.

Ca

The political revolutions of the times are enough to seal the death-warrant of Catholicism, but it has to encounter a far more important spiritual revolution. tholicism belongs to what may be called the dogmatical age of Christianity, the age, when it was thought our religion might be distilled into a creed, which would prove an elixir of life to whoever would swallow it." We have now come to learn, that Christianity is not a dogma, but a spirit; that its essence is the spirit of its

divine founder; that it is of little importance what church a man belongs to, or what formula of doctrines he subscribes; that nothing is important but the su preme love, choice, pursuit of moral perfection, shining forth in the life and teachings of Christ. This is the true Catholic doctrine, the creed of the true church, gathering into one spiritual communion all good and holy men of all ages and regions, and destined to break down all the earthly, clay-built, gloomy barriers, which now separate the good from one another. To this great idea of reason and revelation, of the understanding and heart, of experience and philosophy, to this great truth of an advanced civilization, Catholicism stands in direct hostility. How sure then is its fall!

The great foe of the Romish church is not the theologian. He might be imprisoned, chained, burned. It is human nature waking up to a consciousness of its powers, catching a glimpse of the perfection for which it was made, beginning to respect itself, thirsting for free action and developement, learning through a deep consciousness that there is something diviner than forms, or churches, or creeds, recognising in Jesus Christ its own celestial model, and claiming kindred with all who have caught any portion of its spiritual life, and disinterested love; here, here is the great enemy of Catho licism. I look confidently to the ineradicable, everunfolding principles of human nature, for the victory over all superstitions. Reason and conscience, the powers by which we discern the true and the right, are immortal as their author. Oppressed for ages, they yet live. Like the central fires of the earth, they can heave up" mountains. It is encouraging to see under what burdens and clouds they have made their way, and we must remember that by every new developement, they are brought more into contact with the lifegiving, omnipotent truth and character of Jesus Christ. It makes me smile, to hear immortality claimed for Catholicism or Protestantism, or for any past interpretations of Christianity; as if the human soul had exhausted itself in its infant efforts, or as if the men of one, or a few generations, could bind the energy of human thought and affection for ever. A theology at war with the laws of physical nature, would be a battle of no doubtless issue. The laws of our spiritual nature give still less chance of success to the system, which

would thwart or stay them. The progress of the individual, and of society, which has shaken the throne of Rome, is not an accident, not an irregular spasmodic effort, but the natural movement of the soul. Catholi

cism must fall before it. In truth, it is very much fallen already. It exits, and will long exist as an outward institution. But compare the Catholicism of an intelligent man of the nineteenth century, with what it was in the tenth. The name, the letter remain-how changed the spirit! The silent reform spreading in the very bosom of Catholicism, is as important as the reformation of the sixteenth century, and in truth more effectual.

Catholicism has always hoped for victory over Protestantism, on the ground of the dissensions of Protestants. But its anticipations have not approached fulfilment, and they show us how the most sagacious err, when they attempt to read futurity. I have long since learned to hear with composure the auguries of the worldly wise. The truth is, that the dissensions of Protestantism go far to constitute its strength. Through them its spirit, which is freedom, the only spirit which Rome cannot conquer, is kept alive. Had its members been organised, and bound into a single church, it would have become a despotism as unrelenting, and corrupt, and hopeless as Rome. But this is not all. Protestantism, by being broken into a great variety of sects, has adapted itself to the various modifications of human nature. Every sect has embodied religion in a form suited to some large class of minds. It has met some want, answered to some great principle of the soul, and thus every new denomination has been a new standard, under which to gather, and hold fast a host against Rome. One of the great arts, by which Catholicism spread and secured its dominion, was its wonderful flexibleness, its most skilful adaptation of itself to the different tastes, passions, wants of men; and to this means of influence and dominion, Protestantism could oppose nothing but variety of sects. I do not recollect, that I ever saw this feature of Catholicism brought out distinctly, and yet nothing in the system has impressed me more strongly. The Romish religion calls itself one, but it has a singular variety of forms and aspects. For the lover of forms and outward religion, it has a gorgeous ritual. To the mere man of the world

it shows a pope on the throne, bishops in palaces, and all the splendour of earthly dominion. At the same time, for the self-denying, ascetic, mystical, and fanatical, it has all the forms of monastic life. To him, who would scourge himself into Godliness, it offers a whip For him who would starve himself into spirituality, it provides the mendicant convents of St. Francis. For the anchorite, it prepares the deathlike silence of La Trappe. To the passionate young woman, it presents the raptures of St. Theresa, and the marriage of St. Catharine with her Saviour. For the restless pilgrim, whose piety needs greater variety than the cell of the monk, it offers shrines, tombs, relics, and other holy places in Christian lands; and above all, the holy sepulchre near Calvary. To the generous, sympathising enthusiast, it opens some fraternity or sisterhood of Charity. To him, who inclines to take heaven by violence, it gives as much penance as he can ask; and to the mass of men, who wish to reconcile the two worlds, it promises a purgatory, so far softened down by the masses of the priest, and the prayers of the faithful, that its fires can be anticipated without overwhelming dread. This composition of forces in the Romish church, seems to me a wonderful monument of skill. When in Rome, the traveller sees by the side of the purple lackied cardinal, the begging friar; when under the arches of St. Peter, he sees a coarsely dressed monk holding forth to a ragged crowd; or, when beneath a Franciscan church adorned with the most precious works of art, he meets a charnel-house, where the bones of the dead brethren are built into walls, between which the living walk to read their mortality; he is amazed, if he gives himself time for reflection, at the infinite variety of machinery which Catholicism has brought to bear on the human mind; at the sagacity with which it has adapted itself to the various tastes and propensities of human nature. Protestantism attains this end by more simple, natural, and, in the main, more effectual ways. All the great principles of our nature are represented in different sects, which have on the whole a keener passion for self-aggrandisement, than the various orders in the Romish church, and thus men of all varieties of mind find something congenial, find a class to sympathise with.