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PRICES OF CANAL SHARES, DOCK STOCKS, &c.

At the Office of R. W. Moore, 5, Bank Chambers, Lothbury.

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"R. S." ought to have been thanked before; but the Editor doubts whether good is likely to arise from the public discussion of such a question.

A "Constant Reader," whose letter was not in time for this month's Correspondence, asks on what authority Dr. Faussett has stated (in his reply to Mr. Newman, prefixed to his sermon) that the term "altar" was excluded from our formularies at the Reformation. He adds, that in the rubric of the Coronation Service, printed for the Prayer Book and Homily Society by the Queen's printers, 1838, the word occurs thirty-eight times.

The account of " Bishop's College" should have been inserted this month, but for the great press of matter; particularly under the head of Documents, which, it is hoped, will be found not only unusually full, but valuable. Some things (particularly the interesting proceedings at Exeter relating to Dominicals) which were not received in convenient time for that department, to which they more properly belong, will be found in that of " Events." This exuberance has kept some articles standing in type which were prepared a month ago, and prevented the Editor's immediately availing himself of some communications received during the present month, as he hopes soon to do.

The Editor observed with surprise, in the last Number of the Magazine, that the person whose business it is to collect the information for Events &c., had in two or three cases mixed up the Appointments, Deaths, &c., of Scotch ministers with those of the English clergy. It was stated in the Notices last month, that, from the time of the coronation, the Magazine was exceedingly hurried; and in consequence, the part of the Magazine referred to was not examined as usual.

The Abbate Antonio De Luca, Professor in the university of Rome, is preparing for the press an Italian translation of the Rev. W. Whewell's History of the Inductive Sciences.

THE

BRITISH MAGAZINE.

SEPT. 1, 1838.

ORIGINAL PAPERS.

OBSERVATIONS ON PRUSSIAN OFFICIAL PAPERS RESPECTING THE CONDUCT OF THE ARCHBISHOP OF COLOGNE.

AN official document, of great interest to all Europe, has lately been issued in Berlin, entitled 66 a Representation of the Conduct of the Prussian Government towards the Archbishop of Cologne." * This interest consists, not merely in an authentic account of the differences with that prelate, but in a complete exposé of the principles of Prussian ecclesiastical polity, and an incidental exhibition of the present policy of the court of Rome, attested and confirmed by documents furnished from the government archives. The attempt to introduce the Prussian system of education into this country, and the political supremacy which popery has just recovered, make both topics deserving of attention. Every thinking person must know that the plan of education is only a part of a whole organized system of government, and must therefore be anxious to know in what relation the Prussian government stands to religion and the church at large. Every one who sees what the church of Rome is doing here must be sure that she is not idle elsewhere, and must therefore desire to understand her foreign operations, and thus get some idea of the object at which she aims. The document before us communicates the information required, and is therefore deserving of notice in this Magazine. The Prussian narrative is divided into two parts. The first contains an account of its policy respecting the mixed marriages of protestants and Roman catholics, and the conduct of the Archbishop of Cologne. The second relates the history of the archbishop's interference in the affairs of the university of Bonn. The former will furnish the matter of the present article.

It is well known that the peace of Westphalia consigned protestant

Darlegung des Verfahrens der Preussischen Regierung gegen den Erzbischof von Cöln, Berlin, den 25ten November, 1837.

VOL. XIV.-Sept. 1838.

2 L

districts of Germany to the dominion of Roman-catholic sovereigns, and Roman-catholic populations to the rule of protestant potentates. The coexistence of the two confessions in the same country led to mixed marriages, and the fact of mixed marriages to legislation on the subject. When Prussia got possession of Silesia and its elder provinces on the lower Rhine, it found that such marriages were common, and subject to no particular difficulty. The law prescribed in such cases, that the male children should be educated in the religion of the father, the females in that of the mother. This was a most unnatural state of things, led to divisions, strife, and hatred, in families, and must have tended to produce that religious indifference which has since prevailed in Germany. But it was a necessary consequence of the long conflict which ensued upon the German Reformation. Religious liberty was not there the triumph of truth, vouchsafed by the providence of God, as a reward to patient suffering, but a purchase effected by the sword, and the exertion of human power. The peace that followed decreed, that truth and error should coexist on equal terms, and hence all the evils that have resulted. The King of Prussia saw some of the mischief, and endeavoured to mitigate its influence so far as circumstances would permit. On the 21st of November, 1803, he issued a decree, that, for the future, all the children of such marriages should be educated in the religion of the father; and this law he subsequently extended to the new possessions on the Rhine assigned to him by the peace of 1815. Here he found the Roman clergy a little more zealous than those of his old provinces, and requiring a promise that all the children resulting from a mixed marriage should be educated in the Roman-catholic faith. The following cabinet-order was therefore issued the 17th August, 1825, extending the decree of 1803 to the new provinces:

"In the Rhine provinces, and in Westphalia, there is continued, as I learn, this abuse, that [Roman] catholic clergymen require from betrothed persons of different confessions a promise, that the children to be expected from the marriage, without any difference of sex, shall be educated in the [Roman] catholic religion, and that, without this promise, they refuse to perform the marriage ceremony. The requiring of such a promise can be conceded just as little to the [Roman] catholic, as contrary wise to the evangelic clergy. In the eastern provinces of the monarchy, the law is, that legitimate children, without distinction of sex, should be educated in the religion of the father, (declaration of 21st Nov. 1803.) In these parts of the state, mixed marriages are also concluded, and the marriage benediction given by [Roman] catholic clergymen ; and there is no reason why the same law should not be enacted for the western provinces. Accordingly, I hereby command, that the declaration of the 21st Nov. 1803, be also followed in the Rhine and Westphalian provinces, and be printed, together with this order, in the collection of laws, and in the official gazettes of the governments concerned. Obligations of this kind already entered into by betrothed parties are to be regarded as null and void. "The state ministry will give the further directions. "Berlin, 17th August, 1825.”

"(Signed) FREDERIC WILLIAM."

To an English reader it may seem strange that a pious protestant prince should make a law, according to which, in many cases, all the children of a family must be educated in Roman error; and to some it will appear more strange still that the civil governor should interfere with parents in the religious education of their children. But we

must not forget, that such is the state of things gradually brought about by the development of German history. We must remember that, in the continental states, what is here called liberty of conscience never existed, and is totally unknown. The civil governor is in all more or less despotic; and consequently, duty to the state is the first and great commandment, religion is only the second. In such a state of things, the Prussian system of education is not only possible, but necessary. By the Westphalian peace, which decreed the coexistence of popery and protestantism on equal terms, the state is totally separated from the church, and, as possessing the power, is necessarily supreme. There must, therefore, be a system of compulsory stateeducation to make the children citizens. But to attempt the introduction of such a system into England, it is necessary to annihilate the history of the last three hundred years, to reverse the whole order of things developed in the course of that history, and to eradicate the fundamental principle of the British constitution. In a word, it is necessary to destroy liberty of conscience, and to make the government despotic; yea, it is necessary to deny that there is any such thing as religious truth, and to take up the infidel principle, that all religions are equally good and true. And this, it is to be feared, is the true object of those who promote the scheme of national education. Truth is ever exclusive. The church of England, therefore, looks upon herself as the pillar of the truth in these realms; and hence the infidel wishes for national education, in order to take it out of the hands of the church; and the Romanist joins in the cry, because he hopes thereby to destroy or neutralize the church's influence.

But to return; this new law did not produce the desired effect. The Roman priests were, indeed, afraid openly to disobey it; and not having Christian courage to declare openly and honestly that obedience was contrary to their religion, they contrived a way of evading it. They did not dare to demand the forbidden promise, but they refused to marry those who did not voluntarily offer to make it. The Prussian government, however, was not so weak and inconsistent as first to make a law, and then suffer it to be broken or evaded with impunity. An application was made to the Roman bishops to interfere; but they replied, that, though willing, such interference was impossible without a papal authorization. The government, with becoming dignity, informed them of their fixed and immoveable determination to uphold the law, signifying, at the same time, that the bishops might, if they pleased, apply to the pope, and promising to support such application at Rome. The bishops accordingly prepared an application, and presented it to the government to be forwarded. The then pope, Leo XII., expressed himself favourably; but before any definite arrangement was made, he died. Pius VIII., however, took the matter up, and appointed Cardinal Cappellari, now Pope Gregory XVI., his diplomatic agent, to carry on the negotiation. The consequence was, that on the 25th March, 1830, a breve was addressed to the four bishops, and a private instruction sent by

*

The Archbishop of Cologne, the Bishops of Treves, Münster, and Paderborn.

Cardinal Albani on the 27th of the same month. These documents deserve the serious consideration of all who wish to understand the present policy of the church of Rome.

Papal Breve of the 25th March, 1830.

PIUS P. P. VIII.

Venerable Brethren,-Health and apostolic benediction. In letters addressed two years ago to our predecessor, Leo XII., of glorious memory, you have diligently explained, venerable brethren, the extreme difficulty in which you are placed, because that, in a civil law, enacted a few years ago, it has been commanded, that in mixed marriages the children of both sexes should be educated in the religion of the father, or certainly according to his pleasure; and at the same time the priests have been forbidden to require from persons about to contract this sort of marriage any promise respecting the religious education of their future offspring. We ourselves, also, even from that very time, participated in that profound grief with which that most excellent pontiff was affected, on account of these your perplexities, which those letters more fully explained. But now we are afflicted with a more serious distress, because, by the inscrutable judgment of God, it has been reserved for our humility to return you the answer which our predecessor, prevented by death, was unable to give; inasmuch as it is for this holy see altogether unlawful to permit all those things which ye have signified as being required in those countries for the execution of that law. But there are two things which refresh us not a little-namely, your own zeal, and that of the priests subject to you, for the defence of the doctrine of the church, and the preservation of its rules, which zeal you have also manifested in the said letters to Leo XII.; and [secondly] the indulgence of the most serene King of Prussia, who, as you have intimated, himself suggested to you, that, ingenuously explaining the whole state of things to this apostolic see, ye should consult it on the subject of your anxieties. Hence, therefore, we reasonably trust, not only that ye will plainly obey these our rescripts, but also that the majesty itself of the most serene king will not be angry with you, if, complying to him heartily in civil matters, in those things however which respect not the civil effects of matrimony, but the very sanctity of matrimony itself, and have reference to the religious duties of the married parties, ye keep the sacred rules of the catholic religion. Therefore, to come to the point, it is not necessary for us to instruct your fraternities, (fraternitates vestras,) most skilled in all sacred learning, what is the mind of the church against those mixed marriages which form the subject of discussion. It is not, therefore, unknown to you, that the church itself eschews marriages of this kind, as implying no small measure of indecency (deformitatis) and spiritual danger; and that, on that account, this apostolic see has always taken the most earnest and constant care that the canon laws forbidding such marriages should be observed.

But if Roman pontiffs have been found sometimes to give dispensation from that most holy interdict of the canons, they have done it, indeed, for grave reasons, and with reluctance, and have been accustomed to add to their dispensations an express condition of suitable cautions to be given before the marriage, not only that the catholic party should not be perverted by the acatholic, but rather should know that he is bound to the utmost of his power to draw away the other party from error; but also that the offspring, of both sexes, to proceed from the said marriage should be altogether educated in the sanctity of the catholic religion. But ye know, venerable brethren, that the object of all these cautions is, that the natural and divine laws relating to this matter might be preserved inviolate; since it is certain that catholic persons, whether male or female, who thus contract marriages with acatholics, and rashly expose themselves or their future offspring to the danger of perversion, not only violate the canonic sanctions, but also directly and most grievously sin against natural and divine law. And hence also you understand already, that we also should be guilty of a most grievous crime before God and the church if, in the matter of contracting marriages of this sort in those regions, we should consent that anything should be done, either by you or the parish priests of your dioceses, whereby, if not in words, yet in fact, they should be indiscriminately approved. Wherefore we, highly commending that your zeal wherewith you have hitherto laboured to turn away from mixed marriages the catholics committed to your care,

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