PROLEGOMENA. CXXXl. 



of private judgment in matters of religion has 

 brought on whole nations. 



In former times, and for nearly fifteen hun- 

 dred years out of the eighteen centuries that 

 Christianity has existed, our religion was the 

 public faith of all Christendom : all the early 

 Christians, the Saints, all those in whose names 

 even protestant churches are dedicated, and 

 indeed the greatest writers of every age and 

 country, were firm believers in and members of 

 the Catholic church. Heresy sprung up here and 

 there among obstinate people, but was soon re- 

 pressed : the faith of Christ prevailed, and it 

 bound all ranks of society together as brothers, 

 in the bond of peace, and kept them in a life of 

 comparative righteousness. The great crimes of 

 that period, for crimes there always have been in 

 all periods, were rare, and were committed by 

 Princes and a few opulent people who fell from 

 the practice of Christianity, owing to the temp- 

 tation of riches and power ; but, on the whole, 

 society was much freer from crime, distress, and 

 misery, than at present, as has been satisfactorily 

 proved by authentic documents.* In good old 



* I do not profess to agree in everything with Mr. Cobbett, 

 but, nevertheless, his little cheap \vc k on the Protestant Reform- 

 ation is so full of real historical facts relative to the origin of the 

 Protestant Religion in England, and the degradation and misery 

 that it has entailed on the people, that I can recommend it safely 

 to the attentive perusal of all those who wish to enquire into the 

 truth. Cobbett does not profess to be a Catholic ; he writes 

 merely what he finds authentic in history. 



