who dispatched St. Augustine, and his pious associates, on this important business, in 596; that they succeeded in diffusing the light of faith; and that the whole country finally became a most flourishing portion of the church; an island of saints. From that era to the period called the Reformation, the Pope was here considered as the father of the faithful. His jurisdiction was acknowledged; his authority remained undisputed. Amidst all attempts of the pontiffs to correct various abuses, and during the angry discussions under the arbitrary and tyrannical sway of the Conqueror, or his immediate descendants; or when the pride, passion, and violence of the first of the Plantagenets hurried him to the most unwarrantable proceedings; at these critical periods, the spiritual claims of the Pontiffs were never questioned, but maintained in their full force. This state of things continued for a term of about nine hundred years; till Henry VIII., for reasons and under circumstances, with which the reader is well acquainted, threw off the yoke, and placed the tiara on his own head. It is a matter of public notoriety, that neither reason nor religion suggested this measure, but that pride, avarice, and lust, gave an impulse to the whole proceeding. Let the catechist then boast of the freedom of his church, if he can prove such a boast to be justifiable; but let him reflect, that both reason and religion should lead him to make the most heartfelt acknowledgments to the piety and zeal of the apostolic see, from which the light of Christianity, with its attendant blessings, has been, under heaven, derived '. 1See a learned Treatise on the Three Conversions of England, by F. Parsons; London, 1688. On the grand Conversion of the Saxons: 'see Bede, i. 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, et seq. QUESTION XVIII. Doth the Church of Rome differ from the Church of England in any other point? ANSWER. Yes; for she holds, 1. That the Public Prayers or Service of the Church, at which people are bound to assist, may lawfully be performed in Latin, or a tongue not understood by the People, 2. That Auricular Confession, or confessing all our mortal sins, with the circumstances of them, in the ear of a Priest, is necessary to Salvation. 3. That Extreme Unction is a necessary Sacrament. 4. That it is unlawful for Priests and Clergymen to marry. 5. That the Church of Rome is infallible. 6. That the Scripture ought not to be read in the vulgar tongue by the common people. 7. That the Books commonly called Apocrypha are canonical Scripture. 8. That the Church of England had no power to reform herself,' OBSERVATIONS. HAVING explained the grounds of the Catholic doctrine on the preceding questions, with clearness and precision, and either obviated or refuted the objections of the catechist, I here pledge myself to remove, by the divine assistance, every difficulty produced by any opponent, on the other subjects of discussion. QUESTION XIX. Why do you not allow of public prayer and services in Latin, or a tongue not understood by the people? ANSWER. 1. Because St. Paul, in the 14th chapter of the first Epistle to the Corrinthians, disputes against such service, shewing that it edifies not, ver. 5, 6. That it is speaking into the air, ver. 9. That it is to be a Barbarian to the people, ver. 11. That it is a childish thing, ver. 20, nay, madness, ver. 23. 2. Not only the Jewish, but the Primitive churches had their public offices in the vulgar language. 3. The unwarrantableness of the thing is so manifest, that even the wiser men of the Roman church find fault with the public service in an unknown tongue. 4. It is against the natural sense of mankind, who think it is fit for them to know what they do, especially in the worship of God. 5. Though people may say their own prayers upon such occasions, yet the end and design of public prayer is lost, which is to join with the priest, or minister, and the congregation in the public devotions, and to say Amen to them. 6. The reasons they give for the use of this service in the Roman church, are so weak and worldly too, that they betray their guilt and error; as being drawn from the majesty of the Latin language, from the priest's being able to read his office in all countries; and the people's greater veneration of what they understand not, &c. OBSERVATIONS. MUCH and undeserved obloquy has been heaped on the Catholic church, for retaining the use of a language, unknown to the people, in the public liturgy. It is roundly asserted to be the intention of the church to keep the vulgar in profound ignorance, and to deprive them of the comfort and benefit of public prayer. But surely, if these pretenders to propriety were to give themselves the trouble to examine the authorized directions given to the pastors, and to ascertain the real spirit with which the old discipline is maintained, they would be led to withdraw their objections to an ancient and venerable practice. That it is the design of the Catholic church to keep the people in ignorance, and to withhold from them the light of instruction, cannot for a moment be supposed, when we consider the unremitting zeal, with which the pastors of the church are cautioned and warned to afford to their flocks the sacred food of the holy Scriptures, and to furnish a clear exposition of all that regards the administration of the sacraments, together with every other point connected with religion'. If such a base purpose, as is imputed to the church by her adversaries, really had an existence, we should not witnsss these directions so forcibly and so repeatedly made. Let the catechist compare the regular and systematic mode of conveying instruction to the people, pursued by Catholic pastors, with the feeble and 1 Conc. Trid, sess. 24 de Reform. c. iv. et vii. |