Creed of Pope Pius IV. (which every beneficed Clergyman, and every non-Catholic before he shall be admitted into that Church, is sworn to profess), can possibly be either tolerant or a friend to religious liberty in others: for he swears to many points of faith very inimical to peace and concord, as the following-"I PROFESS; AND UNDOUBTEDLY RECEIVE, ALL THINGS DELIVERED, DEFINED, AND DECLARED BY THE SACRED CANONS, AND GENERAL COUNCILS, AND PARTICULARLY BY THE HOLY COUNCIL OF TRENT AND LIKEWISE, I ALSO CONDEMN, REJECT, AND ANATHEMATIZE ALL THINGS CONTRARY THERETO, AND ALL HERESIES WHATSOEVER CONDEMNED AND ANATHEMATIZED BY THE CHURCH. THIS IS THE TRUE CATHOLIC FAITH, OUT OF WHICH WHICH I NOW FREELY PROFESS,

NONE CAN BE SAVED;

AND TRULY HOLD, &c."

If these offensive principles be not injurious in their tendency, restrictive of mental freedom, and incompatible with toleration, at least under a settled PROtestant Government, I am much mistaken; and it is the opinion of one of their most moderate authors (p. 140, State and Behaviour of English Catholics, 1781), that "whenever it is found that any sect of men profess principles in religion, which either tend to the destruction of social happiness, or are incompatible with the established order of Government, it will not be denied that the most rigorous means should be used for their suppression."

Yet, this same author tells us," He is convinced that, were certain obstacles removed (such as the views of interest, the animosity of party, the blindness of prejudice, and those thick clouds which controversy has raised), it would appear that the Protestant Church of England and Catholics are divided by a VERY THIN PARTITION." He says, "Take the two professions of faith; ours, as it is sometimes given without the comments of schoolmen; and that of Protestants, as contained in the Thirty-nine Articles

of their Church: compare them studiously together; and I think an inference will be drawn in favour of my assertion."

Mr. Butler, and the Rev. Mr. Wix, think the same→→→ dreaming indeed of a possible UNION BETWEEN THE TWO CHURCHES!!!

I will suppose, for a moment, that English Catholics in power would be friendly to all Court measures, would join their interest to that of the Crown, and be always ready to strengthen the Royal prerogative; yet, it is clear that unrestrained liberty of thought and action on religious subjects, could never be allowed by them to the people at large for this is contrary to the present Pope's express injunctions, and would not be compatible with their solemn obligations to obey the Papal Church,

Moreover, they do not admit, that any other Christian Church exists besides their own; they do not grant, that there are any legitimate Bishops, or any real Ministers of the Gospel, except those in actual communion with the Pontiff; and they must consider many of our secular arrangements intolerably uncanonical and profane-which no Protestant could dispense with, even after SUCH A SUPPOSED

UNION OF THE TWO CHURCHES.

This would, therefore, be only a nominal union and a forced co-operation: it could not possibly be cordial on either side, whether in the affairs of Church or State, and is altogether chimerical in the extreme! But, there is no hazard of a junction, while it is previously necessary to gain important concessions from both parties; and while the consent of the Sovereign power is requisite, before so much as a distant negotiation can be commenced. I have no fear of our present Rulers attempting to produce so absurd a political change, and total an overthrow of the Reformed Religion! Nevertheless, Sir, I think this proposal, as coming from a Clergyman, ought not to pass unnoticed by me on the present occasion.

SIR,

LETTER XIX.

THOUGH I entertain no fear of a direct and immediate attempt being made by our present Rulers, either in Church or State, to unite once more the unreformed See of Rome with the reformed ecclesiastical establishment of England, yet I feel it right to allude here to this subject. The letters of Archbishop Wake to M. Dupin, a Doctor of the Sorbonne, may have given an idea that such a re-union (or rather a junction of the Gallican with the Anglican Church), was practicable; and yet, Sir, the result of that correspondence proved, that" Rocks as high, and more impenetrable than the Alps or the Andes, are cast betwixt us :" thus, indeed, thought the Roman Catholic author of " The State and Behaviour of English Catholics," whose candour is always conspicuous, but not so extravagant as to insult or betray his own Mother Church.

In the 4th Appendix to any modern edition of Mosheim's Ecclesiastical History, you will find this whole correspondence. The translator, in conclusion, remarks; that," from this narrative, confirmed by authentic papers, it will appear with the utmost evidence,

66

"1st, That Archbishop Wake was not the first mover in this correspondence, nor the person who formed the project of union between the English and Gallican churches. 2dly, That he never made any concessions, nor offered to give up, for the sake of peace, any one point of the Established doctrine and discipline of the Church of England, in order to promote this union.

"3dly, That any desires of union with the CHURCH OF ROME, expressed in the Archbishop's Letters, proceeded from the hopes that he at first entertained of a considerable

reformation in that Church, and from an expectation that its most absurd doctrines would fall to the ground, if they could be once deprived of their great support-the Papal authority, the destruction of which authority was the very basis of this correspondence."

Such misconduct was left to be perpetrated by 66 a beneficed Clergyman of the Church of England, who is in the enjoyment of a very respectable Rectory in Essex, and a not less respectable Vicarage in London; who is a Fellow of Sion College, a Member of the Society for promoting Christian Knowledge, the Treasurer and Secretary of the Ecclesiastical Society of Dr. Bray's Associates (of which the Archbishop of Canterbury is the President), the Chaplain at once of a Royal Hospital and of a Royal Duke, &c. &c."§; and to whom we owe the obligation of now publishing an "EARNEST RECOMMENDATION " of such Union to "His Royal Highness the Prince Regent, the Most Reverend the Archbishops, the Right Reverend the Bishops, the Reverend the Clergy, and all Lay Persons who are able and willing dispassionately to consider the important subject."

As I am one of those "Lay Persons" who (if not able) may be thought willing to consider this subject, I will very briefly state my own views,-which arise from an impression left upon my mind when I some time ago read the work alluded to. In the first place, I cannot dissemble my astonishment at this proposal, by a Clergyman of the Church of England; who so little feels the duty he ought to have practised as a faithful son of that Establishment, to which he professes allegiance, and by which he gains a maintenance! I am told, that this beneficed Clergyman has also written a work in explanation and defence of the Thirty-nine Articles and I am surprised that, in doing so, he did not perceive the irreconcilable opposition (both in discipline

§ I learn this from the Eclectic Review for April, 1819, p. 301. *

and doctrine) subsisting between the two Churches of England and Rome.

But

"Non tali auxilio, nec defensoribus istis,

Tempus eget."

Secondly, I observe that Mr. Wix has a most insuperable antipathy against the parent Bible Society, and thinks it is the fertile source of heresy as well as schism: but, so thinks "His Holiness," who presides at Rome; and so think the Cardinal Bishops, and the Inquisitors, and the Jesuits; and so do most Popish Prelates, and Priests, and Apostolic Vicars, all over the world! This coincidence is remarkable; and worthy of the consideration of some other opponents to that Society, whose notions symbolize too much with certain points of doctrine promulgated from Rome, and found in the Trent Catechism.

Thirdly, I see that Mr. Wix has much more charity towards Papists than towards Dissenters, not excepting the Established Presbyterian Church of Scotland, because there are no Episcopal guides in those Churches. Of course, if he argues consistently, the Lutheran, Helvetic, and Calvinistic Churches abroad, are condemned by him as being far less safe depositories of Christianity than the Apostate and Idolatrous Church of Rome!

Fourthly, On that account Mr. Wix unchurches the greater number of religious communities, and does not at all recognize them as real parts of the "Catholic," or Universal Church of Christ, nor fit for him to embrace; but nevertheless he pretends, that a return of the Anglican Church to the bosom of " the Mother and Mistress of all Churches," would quickly draw "all those Protestant Churches" into this one vortex. Does he, then, make so much ado about the "Apostolical DISCIPLINE" of our Church, and totally forget the more important Apostolic DOCTRINES which she inculcates? Is not that mistaking the shell for the kernel; and giving a preponderance to our ex