to us unimpaired in sublimity, beauty, and strength of obligation by the lapse of ages. These constitute overpowering evidence that He who delivered them "spake as never man spake," and that his mission must have been divine, which breathed so much love, so much compassion, so much that is beyond and above what any human teacher ever imagined or expressed. All this, we have now; and this is what is not fairly incorporated into the religious systems of either. Protestant or Catholic. The former substitutes his peculiar hobby of theology; his catechism, prayer-book, creed, confession, articles, or other frames of doctrine are carefully and assiduously taught to old and young, while the teachings of Christ are comparatively neglected. The Romanist rejects the New Testament itself, as of no more authority than a papal bull, and Christ as being no wiser than the pope, both being infallible. But the world is now reading this rejected book, and the readers will compare Christians with

190 THIS WORLD ABUSED BUT PROTECTED.

Christianity. This ordeal has begun: the motto of an advancing army of reformers is the "Fatherhood of God, the brotherhood of man.” What arms can Christians oppose to such invaders? That policy may no longer suffice which has hitherto prevailed, of declaiming against the love of the world, and yet falling with savage severity upon him who offers to disturb a single brick in the grand structure of that society which constitutes this present world. There are no greater friends of political liberty than Protestants, but it is that liberty which lets every man take care of himself, and ruin seize the hindmost; it is that liberty which stimulates all to run, but permits the heat of competition to rise so high that none can stoop to pick up the multitudes who fall exhausted by the way.

191

GRADUAL DECLENSION OF CHRISTIANITY, UNTIL IT LOSES THE IMAGE OF ITS ORIGIN.

HUMILIATING will be the effort of him who, with a clear perception of the sublime and simple instructions of Christ, betakes himself to the task of searching the history of the last eighteen centuries for any extended or national exemplification of these pure lessons. He may experience all the admiration which the struggle of Christianity with heathenism, during a few centuries of its infancy, is calculated to excite: he may be struck with the vigour it infuses, the confidence it inspires, the unfailing courage and fortitude it sustains; but he must suffer the deep mortification of beholding that which could triumph over a world of enemies succumbing to the treachery of professed friends. Christianity was no sooner established than its perversion commenced: crafty, covetous,

and ambitious men made it the instrument of working out their designs, of absorbing wealth, and wielding the power of nations. Whatever of the truth was recognised by the papal church, and whatever of piety may have been displayed from age to age by individuals in her communion, because they could not be out of it, the church of Rome is a fabric as purely human and as entirely opposed to the true spirit of Christ's teachings as any system of idolatry or false religion the world has ever known. The papacy has only honoured and used the truth as a means to sustain her usurped power; and cannot therefore be defended on the ground of having merely disregarded the truth. Considered as a human invention, its great mistake was in the vastness of the power committed to its priests; the extent of this and its nature insured its abuse. It was a power which could not be safely intrusted to human hands. The monstrous corruptions and the enormous wickedness displayed in the history of the papacy are such

as flowed from its constitution. Any other men clothed with such powers would have been as guilty. In all sects of Christians, before and since the Reformation, human nature displays its weaknesses and its depravity according to the power and opportunity afforded to weak or wicked men, who are found in every community and congregation. What warrant has Christ left for any complicated ecclesiastical organization, for high offices, for priestly power, for a splendid ritual or pompous ceremonies! He selected his assistants from the lowest orders of the people he gave them no power but to declare the truth and to heal the sick: he built no temples, and had not where to lay his own head. His church, as he left it, was the simplest possible form of organization. In fact, in all its chief characteristics, it was the opposite of the papacy. He used no ritual, and left none for his followers. He enjoined no ceremonies but those connected with