58 Priests; 11 are Ex-Jesuits. There are five places vacant. This district has also diminished, and is declining very fast.

"These Priests, whose number and distribution I have given, either live as Chaplains in the families of gentlemen, and have the care of the little congregations round them; or else they reside in towns, or in some country-places, where funds have been settled for their support. The chapels are in their own houses. From many places being now vacant, as I have noticed, where Priests were formerly kept, it is evident that their number is greatly on the decrease. The Jesuits also are daily dying away; nor is there any succession to supply their places."-[This was first written in 1780.]—“In the lapse of a few years, we shall see a very great additional falling off. Never, surely, was there a wilder fancy than the common cry of the growth of Popery, and of the great influx of Priests, since the passing of the late act in favour of Catholics!

"Our Priests, in their general character, are upright and sincere: but, narrowed by a bad education, they contract early prejudices, which they very seldom afterwards deposite. The theological lumber of the schools too often supplies the place of more useful furniture. Moderately skilled in the Latin and Greek languages, they know little of their own: nor do they become sensible of their manifold deficiencies, till it be sometimes too late to attempt improve

ment.

"A man truly Orthodox flies heretical company; he fears to be contaminated, and he would not receive instruc tion from so foul a source. A Priest is seldom seen in the society of Protestants. The Catholics, he is told to herd with, either are unable to improve him; or, if able, they are seldom willing. Contracted in his circumstances, he has not the means of drawing information from books; the labours of his calling demand much of his time; and unfa

shioned in the forms of elegant life, his company is not asked for. Thus denied most occasions of improvement, if his native dispositions will allow him, he soon sits down silently contented, and looks no further. If he ever had abilities, disuse will, in a short time, lay them asleep; and at sixty he will probably be found the same man he was at twenty-five.

"Whilst the Jesuits stood, St. Omer was their great school for classical improvement; and they supplied England with many able and active Churchmen. At the expulsion of that body from France, their College was given to the Clergy of Douay: in whose hands it now is; but as yet it seems to have answered little purpose. English Catholics are not sufficiently numerous to supply scholars for so many houses.-The Jesuits themselves first retired to Bruges, in the Austrian Netherlands, where they opened another College; but, on their total suppression a few years after, that house also was dissolved, together with every other foundation they possessed. They then erected an Academy at Liege (for their spirit of laudable enterprise was not to be broken), under the protection of the Bishop and Prince of that place. They are now no longer Jesuits; but their Academy is in great estimation, and the children of our Catholic gentry principally resort thither for education."

Besides the Order of Jesuits, in England, this author gives some account of the Nuns, the Dominicans, the Franciscans, the Benedictines, &c. &c.

I have thought it was fair to let that candid writer tell his own story, and wish an account as little alarming as this could be authenticated in 1819; but, Sir, you know the fact to be quite otherwise. It cannot be supposed, however, that any private individual, unconnected with Roman Catholics, can find out the present number of their Priests.

SIR,

LETTER IX.

PROBABLY you will allow that my first supposition is sufficiently established; viz. THE REVIVAL OF POPERY, not only in Europe and other quarters, but also in this part of the British Empire. I shall have no difficulty in convincing you, that the spirit or genius of Roman Catholics, as a body, remains the same. which it was in former ages; though the means of exercising their spiritual intolerance may be more limited by outward circumstances. Should these restraining circumstances, however, by any change of events, be greatly altered in their favour, it cannot be doubted that Popery may then rise into immediate and powerful operation; her true and inherent character will then be developed; her political importance and pretensions will rapidly advance; and her ambitious demands on the State will be enforced with proportional arrogance and domination. We are now, therefore, to inquire, on what avowed and unchanging PRINCIPLES the Roman Church still acts, and by what injurious MOTIVES she is evidently governed; rather than to ask, for an exact description of her present secular encroachments among the neighbouring States, or for a positive exhibition of her widely extended political dominion.

I have admitted that the latter must be waited for, and can only be anticipated as really existing under more favour able circumstances: then, indeed, it may be too late to resist, and all regrets will be unavailing; but, now we are called on to use the best means of prevention, as foreseeing and avoiding the evil. The direct proofs in point of fact, of her unaltered spirit of intolerance, do not manifest them

selves merely in an open avowal of tyrannical sentiments, quite at variance with the peace and liberty of other Churches; but also, by her recent determination to send out the wily Jesuits, like an army of Locusts, to over-run "ALL STATES AND DOMINIONS," as the Pope's Bull of August 7th, 1814, sets forth! In England, and even in London itself, are found many bold defenders of this odious and hostile measure; some of whom, disguised and under a mask (as Mr. CHARLES BUTLER), do not hesitate to cover or soften down all the past enormities of that Order with one hand, while they hold out the other towards Protestants, as if to offer terms of mutual amity and concord!

That Ex-Jesuits should have hailed with gratitude and joy the day of their regeneration, is natural; but that such men (who know this Order was at first established, and now again is restored, for no ostensible object besides opposing the Reformation of Religion) should assume the sacred garb of friendship, is a mockery to our understandings, too obvious to deceive any person who does not willingly shut his eyes. Yet these same defenders of Jesuitism have the effrontery to pretend that no harm whatever is intended against our Protestant Church, our Protestant Government, our Protestant Legislature, or our Protestant Crown!!-Credat Judæus, non ego.

It is not against Infidelity, Sir, but against "Schism and Heresy" (for so the Reformed religion is called), that 66 THOSE VIGOROUS AND EXPERIENCED ROWERS," as the Sovereign Pontiff names them, are brought at this time into action: yes, it is manifest that the successful efforts of Bible Societies were meant thus to be counteracted, and the fundamental principles of the Reformation withstood. Accordingly, the Briefs of His Holiness are now freely circulating in various languages of the oriental and western nations; while Jesuits, together with other religious Orders,

G

are working the grand engine of Papal Inquisitors, &c. recast and newly fabricated in the Vatican. §

The late DR. GEDDES, a truly respectable Roman Catholic Priest, whom I knew, wrote "A Modest Apology " for the members of his own Communion in Great Britain; which was "addressed to all moderate Protestants, particularly to the Members of both Houses of Parliament, 8vo. 1800." This book has become scarce; and, I shall therefore exhibit a few select passages, bearing on my present subject. You have sometimes expressed to me your deep regret, that it was not in your power (for want of time) to read certain works which I had named as important, and have requested me to make occasional extracts for your perusal; a task, however, which as little comports with my scanty leisure as with your own.

Dr. Geddes, p. 136, observes that there are Protestants, " and their name is LEGION, who are not easily satisfied; to whom our real or pretended tenets, in which we differ, or seem to differ, from Protestants, appear in some degree, and indirectly, politically dangerous: in as far as they are supposed to influence our moral conduct, with respect to those whom we deem Heretics; and, at the same time, to be injurious to the interests of genuine religion, which is the great bond of civil society; and corruptive of the pure Word of God, by ridiculous ceremonies, superstitious rites, and even gross idolatry."-This is not an unfair view of my own objection to granting them such eligibility to high offices of power, as might finally lead to a decided preponderance in the State, or at least to a perpetual struggle for domination

§ The Spanish Sovereign takes an Oath-" to persecute, and command to be persecuted, all heretics and apostates," and also that he will "command to be given to the Holy Office of the Inquisition, all aid and protection, in order that herctics, disturbers of their holy religion, may be seized and punished, conformably to the laws and holy canons," &c. &c.