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world, the cause of Roman and French A third corrupting and lowering motive, power work together. In Syria, in Mesopo- which mixes itself with the true unselfish tamia, and in every part of the Turkish and spirit of the Christian Missionary, is zeal for Persian Empires, the extension of French sect-the distinguishing feature of the aninfluence and the Roman Catholic commu- cient Pharisee. We have already slightly nion are co-extensive. Wherever members touched on this, when speaking of self-interof the latter exist, the French consul assumes est, to which, while it seems to be the optheir patronage and protection. The exter- posite, it is in fact the most closely allied. nal conversions, which have frequently taken No religious body is free from it: and of place, of whole Armenian and Chaldean com- all motives that spur mankind to action, it munities into Roman ones, have had no other is probably the strongest. Unlike gross selfobject, than to obtain the restlessly active interest, it seizes on the noblest as well as succour of the French consuls, against the the lowest minds: and it moves unchecked oppression and misrule of their Ottoman by conscience, because while it is a selfishgovernors and neighbours. Nor is this poli- ness, it seems not to be one. It would be tico-religious propaganda confined to any re- difficult to analyze the various ties, which gion of the world. The most unworthy bind a man so strongly to his sect. Their page, in the history of modern Roman mis- strength by no means depends on the intrinsions, has been their introduction of the bit- sic truth and goodness of its doctrine. It is ter element of religious differences, into the probaly greatest, when the sect can presuccessful Protestant mission field of Polyne- sent an object to every affection and desire sia, where there was plenty of fresh ground for within man's heart, the evil as well as the them to break up, among the yet untouched good. A religion that could contain at the heathen. In this work, the missionaries same time a gross idolatry for the ignorant, have been supported at every step by French and a pure monotheism, or, perhaps, a mysships of war; and they requite the assistance tic pantheism for more enlightened minds, which they receive, by preparing the natives which could teach at once a pure morality for incorporation into that colonial empire, which in spite, of the natural expansion of the Anglo-Saxon race now established on every side, France still hopes to found in the Pacific Ocean. Many zealots in the missionary cause have felt displeased, that political influence has never been exerted by England in support of her missions: we think that she has acted wisely. Her missions are now the spontaneous growth of the Christian zeal of her own people: they are at once the witnesses and the stimulas of the life of her churches: they sustain, in British Christians' minds, the consciousness of the duty of personal sacrifices in the cause of religion. Nor has she ever contented herself with that bastard semi-heathen Christianity, which is always the first, and often the only, fruit of state-proslytism. Government aid to missions has been almost unknown in British posssessions, until within the last few years. Very lately, it has been attempted in New Zealand, where the government has furnished the heads of religious bodies with the means of supporting industrial schools; at the Cape of Good Hope, where the present Governor hopes that missionary influence may prove the means We have marshalled a formidable array of preventing another Caffre war; and in of defects along with the excellencies of the India, where large assistance is offered to missionary spirit and labour. We must the educational establishments of the Mis- now seek to find both the good and evil, as sions. These are doubtful and hazardous developed in existing missions. experiments: we trust that the hopes entertained by their promoters may not be disappointed.

for the pure, and provide an easy routine of formal duties, with ready periodical absolution of all offences, for the gross and carnalsuch, perhaps, would be the religion that would attach to itself most hearts, and bind them with the strongest tie. This sectarian zeal has both its good and its evil side. It inspires a heroic courage, yet always courage for sect, and for goodness, only to the extent which the sect teaches it, or in the forms in which it lives and moves within the sect: for all that is good and noble beyond the sect's limits, it has neither eye nor nor feeling. It produces great self-denial-denial of the individual self;-yet always in the interest of the corporate one. It cannot rise to scrutinize the pretensions of that sect, round which all the affections have been taught to gather, and which, at the fullest developement of the principle, fills to it the place of home and country, of father and mother, of wife and children, of conscience and of God. Far be it from us to deny the bravery and self-denial, which have been displayed by men who have given up their hearts' whole love and devotion to their sect: yet must we pronounce it an idolatry.

Those that have spread over the widest surface, and have been promoted by the most diversified means, have been those of

the Church of Rome. The work of Dr. from reports in many respects untrustworBrown professes to give no account of these. thy. At any rate, her operations have been He alleges, as one of the reasons for this too wide, and the effects of them too imporomission, the impossibility that would often tant to be ignored. occur, of distinguishing between truth and Her great organization for collecting falsehood in the narrations of the mission- funds for Foreign Missions is the Lyons aries. The quotation by which he justifies Society for propagating the Faith. The this assertion, certainly establishes the im- balance-sheet of this Society, which we print posibility, in many cases, of receiving their below, will furnish a tolerably complete statements if uncorroborated. This is one chart of her present operations. We have of the cases in which the church of Rome somewhat changed the arrangement of the suffers and must suffer to her latest hour, for countries; and, in order that the sums of her own admission of the principle that ex- money named may be compared more pediency in some cases justifies a lie. But readily with those of Protestant societies, there are other authorities in existence be- we have exchanged francs for sovereigns, at sides her own servants: nor is it impossible the liberal rate of one of the latter for to extract a certain amount of probable truth twenty-five of the former.

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*"It seems," says M. Cerri, Secratary to the congregation de propaganda Fide, in a Report which he gave of the state of the Roman Catholic religion throughout the world to Pope Innocent XI., in the latter part of the seventeenh century-" it seems to be the constant opinion of all the members of the congregation, that little credit is to be given to the relations, letters, and solicitations that come from the Missionaries. Hence it is that the usual answer of the congregation consists only of asking further information, which often proves of no use," &c. &c. Account of the state of the Roman Catholic Religion throughout the world, written for the use of Pope Innocent XL, by Monsignor Cerri, Secretary of the Congregation de propaganda Fide.-London, 1715. P. 182.

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sum of £29,124, is spent within the limits of the wealthy United States; especially when this large sum is confronted with the extremely small contribution of £2267 collected in the same country, and when we discover, on further examination of the returns, that more than a third of this contribution (£884) is raised in the single diocese of Boston, no doubt from the Irish operatives in Lowell and other manufacturing towns.

The first point, that strike us here, is that ed to this great organization, about £60,000 to which we have already once adverted, that are devoted to the actual heathen; and the chief place in the van of Papal enter- about £95,000 to various proselytizing prise is held no longer by bigoted, unchang- and self-preserving agencies directed toing Spain, or by retrograde Austria, but by wards its promoters' fellow-Christians. It free-thinking, progressive France. When is a fact of great significance, that the large Louis Napoleon declared the other day, that he was resolved to maintain that ancient title of the French kings, Eldest Son of the Church, he claimed no more than was by right his own. France furnishes nearly two-thirds of the funds for the Papal Propaganda; and if we examine the nominal return of missionaries, we shall find that she also furnishes a very large proportion of the men. Another point worth notice is, the proportion that aggressive missions against rival forms of Christianity bear to those which are directed towards the heathen. To the former kind belong-all those whose sphere of action is in Protestant Europe, on which a sum of £21,517 a year appears to be expended-all those in the Turkish empire and in Persia, which make no attempts to convert the Mussulmans, supported at the annual cost (including Egypt and Abyssinia) of £24,742-while of the very large sum of £42,254, expended within the limits of America, a very small part is applied to the inconsiderable Indian Missions; the chief part is employed in an effort to retain within the obedience of Rome, those multitudes of Roman Catholic emigrants, whom the infectious example of Yankee freedom converts into emancipated and independent

men.

Confining our attention to the work of the Roman Church among the actual heathen, we shall find, first, that the above table does not contain the names of her most ancient and most successful missions. These were within the limits of the Spanish and Portuguese colonies, in which every influence of the secular government, not excepting force,* was in operation for centuries in her favour. She has made the whole of these, including South America, Mexico, and a large portion of the Phillipines, at least nominally Christian; and the fallen power of the Portuguese in India and Ceylon has left behind, in each of these countries, a large body of persons professing Christianity. Her once famous missions to the Indians of Brazil and Paraguay+ have dwindled almost to nothing, since

The £3040 expended in Australia is not devoted to missions to the heathen; and *We believe that, in every Spanish and Portueven the missionary enterprises in New guese colony, the exercise of heathen worship was Zealand and Polynesia have been little prohibited,-in many cases, under pain of death. more than attempts to disturb and tarnish The inquisition was established in all the foreign the victories over heathenism already seand was as active there against heathenism, as it was at home against heresy. sured by the hands of others. We shall The official inventory of the property of these probably find that, of the funds intrust-missions, at the time of their suppression, gives a

settlements;

they lost the energetic superintendence of cannot doubt that, in all the polytheistic nathe Jesuits.

If we look beyond the limits of the colonies of European nations, we find that Rome has gained her greatest successes, in lands where the Buddhist religion prevails-China, India beyond the Ganges, Corea, and Japan. The striking resemblance between the Buddhist system and her own has been remarked by her own missionaries. If a Buddhist nation were to become Roman Catholic, the only changes in external organization and ritual would be, the substitution of beautiful idols for hideous ones,-of a melodious though incomprehensible ritual, for one as incomprehensible but very discordant, of monks and nuns, well-disciplined, active and possibly intriguing, for lax and apathetic ones,-of religious observances equally regular and formal, but with more meaning and spirit hid beneath the outward mechanism, for purely outward and mechanical ones-of a Pope Stork for a Pope Log, which appears to us the exactest description of the Dalai Lama. It seems strange, considering the energy and ability that have been employed, that this change has never actually taken place. We could contemplate the possibility of such a change even with satisfaction, could we divest ourselves of our knowledge-certain knowledge, unless all Church history lies-that every convert gained by the Roman Church, is a fresh soldier enlisted against freedom, and that truth which must sooner or later be found side by side with freedom.

Of the real state of her converts she herself tells us very little. Her adversaries declare that they differ very little from the heathens. Charity prompts us to suspect this statement of exaggeration.* Yet we

tions, her Christianity must remain virtually a Polytheism. That nice boundary line between veneration and adoration, which is so often transgressed even by the educated European, is not likely to be observed very carefully by the pagan neophyte; and, for him at least, if not for all people everywhere, a religion that presents many objects of religious reverence, must necessarily be one of many gods. It is, we believe, admitted, that the Roman Church makes no effort for the intellectual advancement of her converts.* Where education exists already, she competes vigorously for the possession of it. Hence she has many schools in China, where primary education is general; and no less than ninety in the Sandwich Islands, where her campaign is a controversial one against American Congregationalists. But in her Indian missions, which she has now possessed nearly three hundred years, she has not yet introduced a translation of the New Testament, nor done anything to promote Christian schools. In Paraguay the Jesuits taught the Indians to read and write, but never to advance beyond the mere elements; nor was there any danger in these accomplishments, as the missions were isolated from all the world, and no literature could penetrate there except their own. In these South American missions, we have the Roman system perfectly developed, such as might be expected everywhere, did it suffer no check from the other influences which the world contains. The ideal aimed at was to make the converts children in malice, yet to keep them children in understanding, passively submissive to the priest as their spiritual father and expecting from his lips (in Ignatius Loyola's phrase) the jussa Dei per supe riorem. They did become a harmless, patient, obedient race, with scrupulous conscience,

good idea of the immense means that were once at the disposal of the Roman Church. The Jesuits numberless torches and fireworks-the statue of the possessed 30 missions in Paraguay, inhabited by saint placed on a car, which is charged with gar88,864 souls; 771,839 tame cattle; 99,078 horses lands of flowers and other gaudy ornaments, accordand mares; 21,410 mules and asses; 930,976 sheep ing to the taste of the country--the car slowly and goats; wild cattle innumerable. Besides these, dragged by a multitude shouting all along the march they had establishments at most of the principal Span--the congregation surrounding the car, all in conish cities. Their warehouses, offices, colleges, &c., at fusion, several among them dancing or playing with Buenos Ayres, formed a building, so substantial as small sticks or with naked swords-some wrestling, to be bomb-proof, and 144 yards square. Their pro- some playing the fool, all shouting or conversing perty in Spanish South America is valued by Mr. with each other, without any one exhibiting the Robertson at £5,641,000.-T. P. and W. P. Robert- least sign of respect or devotion." son. Letters from Paraguay.

*In India, the Roman Catholics are allowed to retain the distinctions of caste. The following description of a Hindoo Christian festival is quoted by Dr. Allan from Abbé Dubois, a Roman Catholic missionary in India for more than thirty years:"Their processions in the streets, always performed in the night-time, have indeed been to me at all times a subject of shame. Accompanied with hundreds of tomtoms (small drums), trumpets, and all the rdant noisy music of the country, with

*We have great pleasure in being able to quote an apparent exception. The Romish Bishop in Ceylon receives the following testimony from the Anglican Bishop of Colombo:-" He is earnest, I hear, in the work of education; admits the vernacular Bible into his schools; has cleared the images from his chapel; and, in other respects, has shewn himself too much above the prejudices of his people to be very popular either among them or their priests." - Visitation Journal. But, even here, education was already flourishing in the hands of his opponents.

employed on these delicate services. The foundations of the Church in the Sandwich Islands were indeed laid by an Irishman in disguise; but then that disguise was national and appropriate-a sailor's blue shirt, large whiskers and beard, and a short black pipe. But blundering Hibernian zeal is not adapted for the delicate work in China, and that country has to be garrisoned by Frenchmen, Spaniards, and Italians.

dependent mind, and perfectly apathetic will. | stant disguise. They do not venture on But the moment that the artificial seclusion, preaching, or on any public religious act; in which they lived, was broken, and they nor even speak of religion to a stranger, unpassed into the hands of less able and active less sure of their man. The persecutions spiritual guides, the work fell into decay, which they have suffered have most likely and has now almost entirely perished. been exaggerated; but the adventures of all We have already drawn attention to the have not been so agreeable as those of M. great virtue and the great vice of Roman Huc and Gabet; and some have suffered missionaries-freedom from personal self-death even within the present generation. interest, their glory, and sectarian bitterness, We doubt whether any training would comtheir shame. The Protestant missionary municate to an Englishman the necessary never receives a good word from his Roman versatility and suppleness for such an emCatholic competitor: the greatest charity, ployment as this. He would never reconthat he can hope for, is to be (as by M. Huc) cile his feelings to preaching the gospel in a ignored entirely. With this sectarian jea- yellow petticoat, a red sash, and two long lousy, there is found occasionally a trace of pig-tails; nor do we hear of those zealous a sort of old maidish envy, at the thought of Romish legionaries, the Irish priests, being the possession by an adversary of that forbidden and forsworn domestic luxury-a wife. The tone of missionary priests becomes highly acidulated when these ladies are alluded to. This character, with its good and its evil side, is entirely the result of training. The Roman missionary fit, non nascitur. He is an artificial being, as much as a Janissary or a Zouave, or (to quote an example from the softer sex) one of the King of Dahomey's Amazons. We do not mean to institute a With respect to the means which they use comparison between the last-named ladies to effect their purposes, there is probably and the female Roman missionaries, although none conceivable, which has not been in its the African heroine is said to be very chaste, turn employed, from the highest good to the and the Roman one is sometimes very grim. lowest evil. Perhaps the earthly power of We wish only to say, that each of these the Roman Church depends most on the classes is the result of a well-calculated arti- wonderful facility with which she can enlist ficial training. That of the missionary be- the wicked as well as the good in her cause, gins everywhere early, in some countries at and fight with all weapons, whether of hell twelve years old: from that day forward, or heaven. While the immediate followers the qualities to be produced, courage, adroit- of Xavier, pure, and fearless, and self-denyness, veneration and love for Rome, and pas- ing men, were devoting their lives to propasive obedience in her hands, and a total gate her doctrines in India and elsewhere; absence of the smallest suspicion that any- the soldiers of the Duke of Alva, incarnate thing can be true or good in the teaching of fiends, if ever there were such on earth, in the heretic, are always kept in view. The lust, avarice, and cruelty, were promoting situations which these men have to fill often the same cause in the Netherlands; and were demand extraordinary courage and equal as distinctly owned and as highly honoured adroitness; and men are formed, in whom these qualities are admirably combined. In China, their work has been for many years confined to the visitation of scattered communities existing under the ban of the Government. It requires them to live in con

by the master whom they served. The contrast displayed in this instance may serve as a type of the whole warfare of the Church of Rome, and is found realized in every country where she has been permitted to act uncontrolled. It has been so in her missions. In these have been displayed self-denial, courage, zeal, perseverance of the noblest kind; * A Romish missionary in the Sandwich Islands yet also, allied with these, falsehood and boasts that his co-religionists have been more active than the Protestants in attending people sick of the forgery, when opportunity offered; oppres small-pox. He accounts for the backwardness, which sion and persecution, whenever temporal he attributes to his opponents by the following con- governments have placed their sword at her jecture: Peut-être aussi que leur pieuses com- command. Her present position is perhaps pagnes ne voulaient pas que les habits de leurs ré- the happiest that she has ever held, since it vérends époux allassent toucher à ces plaies dégoût permits her to develop the former and nobler class of qualities; while the greater publicity of modern times has checked her untruth

antes dont les malades étaient couverts."--Annales de la Prop. de la Foi. Whether true or false, this is very vulgar, and very uncharitable.

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