430 
should restore them to their original 
state be such a violation ? 
But the motives and the pretences of 
persons less august, are not necessarily 
so identified as those of His Royal 
Highness. Some among these there 
indeed may be, who, “ talking of their 
consciences while they weep over their 
money-bags,” with like consistency, 
may cling, in their dotage, to the pre- 
judices of their nursery, and mingle the 
bigotry of fanaticism with their notions 
of political expediency : but may there 
not be others whose real motives are 
the perpetuation of profitable mono- 
polies ? who in the extension of rights 
see the diminution of power, and con- 
fuse the reason of others to secure their 
own personal ends ? 
So much for the /eaders of this sort 
of civil war against the rights of our 
Catholic brethren of Ireland. With 
respect to the popular cry by which they 
have been seconded, an article before 
us, intended as a communication for 
our Review, but too Jong for that de- 
partment and more appropriate here, 
shall conclude our discussion of this 
subject. 
“ Six Lectures on Popery; delivered 
in King Street Chapel, Maidstone. By 
Witr1aM GroseEr. 12mo.’’—This is one 
of the multifarious publications with 
which the press is teeming, and will pro- 
bably continue to teem, in consequence 
of the new “no popery” cry, which has 
been of late so industriously excited ; 
and, to the revival of which, the insidi- 
ous measure of complicating the ques- 
tion of Catholic emancipation with that 
of pensiéning the catholic clergy, and 
with a precedent for electoral disfran- 
chisement, has so successfully adminis- 
tered. These Lectures affect, indeed, 
a tone of moderation, and make some 
pretension to candour. But while assum- 
ing one mask they throw off another, 
Like the infuriate declamations of a 
certain popular preacher, and the lan- 
guage which has been held in various 
directions, they sufficiently betray, that 
whatever may have been the pretences 
in certain assemblies, it is an intole- 
rance of Catholic opinions, and not any 
political apprehension of danger to the 
constitution, that is the real ground of 
popular hostility against the claims of 
our Irish brethren. Now we have 
quite as much aversion from the theo- 
logical tenets of the Catholics as any 
of their most inveterate opponents ; 
but we would not, therefore, excom- 
municate them, from the participation 
Topics of the Month :—- The Catholic Question. 
(Jane 1; 
of political rights; or keep the great 
majority of an afflicted nation in the 
degraded condition of bondslayes, be- 
cause their consciences dictate to them 
a very different creed, from any we 
could ever subscribe. The very cir- 
cumstance of the publication before us 
being so palpably theological, prevents 
us from entering into any particular 
examination of its contents and argu- 
ments—for with theological controversy 
we have nothing to do, ‘It may not be 
amiss, however, to warn those who are 
so eager in this species of warfare, how, 
in their hostility against particular sects, 
they furnish arms to the unbeliever 
against Christianity itself; which, by the 
way, we never remember to have seen 
a book of theological controversy, which 
did not do. If certain of the arguments. 
on theological tyranny, for example (in 
page 118, in particular) were good against 
Catholicism, the unbeliever could have 
no difficulty in shewing that they were 
equally cogent against the Christian 
faith; and, we strongly suspect that 
the author is himself aware, that what 
he says about the tyranny of the doc- 
trine of transubstantiation,would equally 
apply to belief in the doctrine of the 
Trinity. But the fact is, that all this is 
wniserable sophistry ; a juggling abuse of 
words. There isno tyranny whatever in 
any religious belief, whether it be in the 
mystery of a Trinity, or the mystery of 
transubstantiatiom—i. e. whether it be 
that God is at the same time three and 
one, or, that the aliment of the commu- 
nion table is at the same time bread and 
wine,—the body and blood of Christ. 
One of these may be the orthodox in- 
terpretation of the revealed text, and 
the other a heterodox perversion; but, 
so long as we are left to believe accord- 
ing to our own prejudices, credulity, or 
convictions, there is no sort of tyranny 
in upholding or promulgating either one 
or the other. The tyranny would con- 
sist in arming priests, and judges, and 
jailors, with the power of enforcing 
belief— 
* In proving doctrines orthodox 
“ By apostolic blows and knocks ;’’ 
or, what amounts to the same thing, 
By apostolic bars and locks— 
by dungeons and penalties, and the in- 
quisitions. of perverted law. Let the 
equal justice of a rational government 
but withhold from the priesthood, and 
the priest-ridden of every denomination 
the power of using such arguments as 
these, and if there were a. body, of 
Christians so absurd as to believe that a 
pigeon-pie’ 
