PROLEGOMENA. CXXXlil. 



security may be reposed in the honesty of the 

 people. 



I am aware that one great objection will be 

 raised against my j)icture of Catholic society, 

 that the people were kept in ignorance of many 

 things. It is true that people who were to work 

 for their daily labour, were not taught dancing, 

 and music, and drawing, and mechanical philo- 

 sophy. But on the coming round of all the great 

 festivals, there was good cheer for the tenant at 

 the landlord's and mirth, and fairs, and merry 

 wakes, and country pastimes, not conducted in 

 drunkenness, but in innocent gaiety the result 

 and criterion of true religion, always attended 

 these joyous occasions, without being any inter- 

 ruption to the solemn offices of the day. How 

 contrasted is all this to the gloomy appearance 

 of a drunken protestant Sunday afternoon in 

 London, where alehouses open, are a bad accom- 

 paniment to shops shut up; and where every 

 species of horrid debauchery goes on in a corner, 

 while all out of doors is affected sanctity and 

 mock religion. The streets at night are full of 

 prostitutes, a matter of perfect astonishment to 

 Catholic foreigners, and the watchhouses are full 

 of unruly offenders against the peace I Meanwhile 

 Bible Societies go on liistributing the Scriptures; 

 missionaries are abroad, schools and mechanic 

 institutes increasing, and the word "education" 



