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spreading religious truth, and in their place would have them substitute ourselves, the living ministers of God's holy word in lieu of the material book, at least we are bound to see that we are fit for the work which we claim to be our own. "You dispute," people will say to us, our use of the Bible, and you tell us that we are supplanting you and your ministry by it, but that ruin and confusion will be the reward of our efforts. Now are you qualified yourselves? If religion has nothing to hope for from the circulation of the Bible, has it more to hope for from you?" People born and brought up in the Catholic faith, can palliate and charitably allow the human imperfections which they may observe in the ministers of their faith; they know perfection to be as far removed by nature from the priesthood as from the lay state, and that it can in neither case be obtained without personal care and watchfulness. But to conciliate the jealous minds and win the suspicious hearts of an estranged and alienated people, superhuman excellencies are required and must be aimed at. The ordinary priesthood that would satisfy a Catholic and confiding people, will not suffice to bow down the hearts of a prosperous and haughty nation as the heart of one man. We are not to expect the multitude to be satisfied with written descriptions of the fair beauty and spotless perfections of the bride of Christ, which, however true and intelligible to one who is already a believer, are mere rhodomontade to those who look at the Church from a distance. That which alone can in the ordinary course of God's providence arrest the attention of the people, is the sight of a numerous body in the sacerdotal and religious state, ably and efficiently devoting themselves to the work which lies before them on all sides. This is the proper sequel of a denial that the circulation of the Scriptures are the divine means of propagating the Christian religion.

It will be well that we should know and feel this. For in whatever degree we may succeed in drawing away people's minds from trusting to the Protestant use of the Scriptures, in that same degree we turn them towards the Church, and specially on ourselves, her clergy and priests. The clergy in the Church are messengers of the invisible God, and the reality of their mission has, it is true, credentials external to themselves, be they ever so unworthy of their sacred calling, abundantly sufficient for those who have already a disposition to believe. But God desires

that those who are even ill-disposed to believe, should be brought to believe, should be persuaded, should be gained over and won. And to this end serve the virtues, learning, and high qualifications of the priests. By her prayers, by her virtues, by her many good works of mercy, by the healing medicines which she possesses from the fruits of the tree which God has given for the healing of the nations, by the learning and useful knowledge of her clergy, the Catholic Church has hitherto earned for herself a home among the nations where she dwells, and to the end of time she will never prevail by any other means. When her members become overgrown with wealth, and forget the cross under which they serve, people grow suspicious of her, and they turn their attention to a Bible religion, which has a great deal to say for itself when scandals abound in the Church, and they turn her out of an abiding place in which they cease to see the Christian works they know well how to expect. And when the Catholic Church rises up to regain her lost empire over the hearts of a nation where she once reigned as queen, she has before her, her original task, to come to them with the same patient, meek, and lowly virtues, the same untiring and unwearied spirit of going about doing humble good, that other people will not care to do. She must come with an active, well-trained, well-instructed and enterprising priesthood, with pious and diligent religious of both sexes, devoting themselves to every work of christian mercy which circumstances permit, she must be able to point to a moral and affectionate laity, as the fruit of her doctrine and instructions. All this and far more, is the legitimate sequel of denying the Protestant use of the Scriptures, and most Protestants have discernment enough to see that it is so.

When, therefore, we do come forward to deny the use now made in England of the Scriptures, let us be aware that we invite the multitude to come and inquire what sort of persons the Catholic priests are, that we in a manner provoke them to ask what our character is and what our habits are, that we court a scrutiny and an examination. And although no one who fairly considered the severe oppression and penury under which the Catholic remnant of England has long subsisted, could possibly discover a just ground of reproach in the imperfections he might find, yet persons in general will bring to the enquiry a high idea of what the Catholic priest ought to

be, and will, without bestowing a thought upon the circumstances of the case, be offended if they do not find the reality correspond to their ideal conception. It may be well to be aware of this. For it ought to be in no way a matter of surprise, if some persons from the multitude, without a thought of their real virtues, yet imagining themselves on their first superficial inquiry to have discovered that the Catholic priests are generally only a poor, illinstructed, snuff-taking, common sort of persons, should continue in their incredulity upon the truth of the Catholic Church being the divinely appointed means of spreading the gospel, and not the indiscriminate circulation of the Scriptures. Whereas, if every priest employed on our missions, could be not less wise and winning than St. Francis of Sales or St. Philip Neri, we might expect to see among such persons, an increase in the number of those disposed to prefer their ministry to the dry reading of the Bible. This view of the matter then may at least benefit ourselves. It would seem to say to those already in our missions, "for mercy's sake remember whom you represent, be as kind, attractive, gentle, and patient as you can, acquire what perfections you may, and bear in mind that as a city set upon a hill cannot be hid, so the Catholic priest cannot escape being an object of scrutiny, and that strangers will judge of the religion by what they see the priest to be, and that the holy sacraments, especially confession, will be seen through a doubly odious medium, if there be anything in the priest that can awaken disgust to the fastidious tastes which in these times abound."

While to students in our seminaries it would seem to say, you are designed to serve God in an office in which you will have the life and actions of the incarnate Son of God for your standard and your example, beware then how you spend your time in idleness, or in acquiring frivolous accomplishments, instead of solid and useful knowledge; and if you can, keep from snuff-taking, that never did any body any good, who had not a physician's prescription for it. And remember that the lot before you is that of representing Jesus Christ, the God incarnate teacher of mankind, and that without the knowledge necessary to your state, you will be a certain scandal and sorrow to the Church, and will surely bring condemnation upon yourself. It will be as well also to bear in mind, that not

withstanding the prevailing taste for medieval ceremonial and architecture, we still do not live in the middle ages, when there existed in the minds of all a mysterious reverence for the priesthood, which no doubt had its share in beguiling more than one unhappy priest to prefer the esteem in which his office was held, to the labour of qualifying himself for it; but we live in times not overburdened with reverence for the sacred office, and abounding with wits sufficiently sharpened to perceive the little consistency of high pretensions and a splendid exterior, with meagre qualifications and imperfect attainments. Not merely then for the honour of our calling, the disgrace of which falls upon the truth of God, but from a debt of mercy to those many amiable and alienated minds, among whom hereafter the sacred functions when conferred may be carried, there is a duty of aiming beyond a common mediocrity. If the philosopher of antiquity could arrive at the maxim, that notwithstanding the shortness of the longest life and its ever precarious continuance, it was still the part of the wise man to aim at the highest excellence, Ep' Gov evÕéxeraι alavariçew, (Arist. Ethic. Nicom.) can it be too much to ask, that among the candidates for the Catholic priesthood, and in our peculiar circumstances, a spirit, at least not inferior, may be found to prevail.

But we are neglecting M. Malou and the remainder of our subject; we had said incidentally, that the holy Scriptures, like every other of God's good gifts, were given to be used. It now remains to be seen, what in the view of the Catholic Church is the use for which they were divinely intended. Almost the commonest topic of vilification against the Catholic Church, urged with varying degrees of good and bad faith is this, that for the sinister design of magnifying her own priesthood, and obtaining an easier dominion over a tame and toothless people, the Catholic Church strictly interdicts all circulation of the word of life among her people; she is said, in a spiritual point of view, to put out the eyes of the people, that she may lead them blindfold with the less power of resistance on their part. To what extent this may be true, shall now be learned from the work before us, that at least the honest and sincere may know what the Catholic Church does hold with regard to the use of the Scriptures, and what her ideas are respecting them.

M. Malou speaks as follows, p. 27.

"Here three quite distinct questions present themselves :-I. What is the doctrine of the Catholic Church touching the use of the sacred books? II. What is her legislation? III. What is her practice?

"I. We believe that the Holy Scriptures have been given to the Church for the instruction of all the faithful, and that they have been specially entrusted to the pastors in order that they should preserve them pure and intact, in the midst of the vicissitudes of human societies, and that they should habitually make them the basis of their instructions. We believe that the greatest part of the revealed truths are contained in them, and that the working Church, that is, the body of pastors, of whom the successor of St. Peter is the chief, has received the commission to interpret them in an authentic manner by means of a living tradition which is preserved amongst them, and by virtue of the authority they have received from the Saviour. We believe that in a number of cases the Holy Scriptures are by themselves sufficient to confound heresy when they are interpreted in the sense of the holy Fathers, and conformably to preceding decisions of the Church. But we believe also with Tertullian, that they are not fitted to resolve absolutely and definitively any controversy, when they are separated from the principle of authority, and interpreted according to preconceived opinions or human systems; then, to use the strong expression of the African Doctor, they are fitted only to disorder the brain and the stomach. We believe that the Scriptures do not contain all the revealed truths: but we believe that it is necessary for those who have cure of souls to read them, and that to read them may be good for all the faithful who have been at all prepared. We believe that God never commanded all the faithful to read the Holy Bible, and to extract from it by their own labour a knowledge of the revelation. We believe that the faithful profit by the Scriptures when they listen with attention and docility to the instruction of their pastors, and that the Church has had legitimate motives for enacting or modifying her laws or local customs that have restrained or encouraged at different times the use of the sacred books among the laity."

Passing over the lengthy exposition of the above summary which follows from page 37 to page 78, we learn what the legislation of the Church has been. It would be impossible to follow the author into the mass of details which he has collected, and which on the whole tend to prove that the Church has shown herself positively and not negatively anxious that the Scriptures should be in the hands of the laity where they manifest a desire for them, and there appears reasonable hope that they will use them