66 be allowed to remark it as singular, that we should never have heard of so very important a distinction before; and that it should now be produced on the bare unsupported evidence of Father Walsh; who, however high he may stand in your favour, does not seem to have enjoyed much from the heads of his own church. But as I certainly do not wish to be "carried "back to distant ages, or harassed with a disquisition on the canons of ancient councils," I admit the point in its fullest extent. Be it so. "Transubstantiation may not be dissembled on "oath;" but to other oaths, and especially to those "of allegiance and supremacy taken to "the king"" equivocation and mental reserv"ation may be very safely applied." You have thus “afforded a very complete answer to all "the sagacious observations we are in the habit "of hearing from divers persons besides "* Mr. Canning, "respecting the folly of the law in demanding such a test." "Father Walsh "has shown to us, that our ancestors were not so "foolish as these very wise persons were pleased "to imagine." But I do not exactly understand how you have "silenced another, and apparently "much graver objection. Almost every one "who speaks or writes on the side of the Ro"man Catholics, from the gravest senator down "to the last speaker at a hustings or tavern * Letter I. p. 78. 66 "dinner, has been accustomed to triumph over "the gross absurdity of requiring oaths as a "security from Roman Catholics, while they "are charged with holding opinions subversive "of the sanction of all oaths."* In my humble opinion, unless the oath contains the transubstantiation test, which no security oath can, (because an oath which is not to exclude Catholics from Parliament cannot call upon them to forswear any of those doctrines, which " by "the indispensable condition of their commu"nion they may not dissemble upon oath);" + this much graver objection stands exactly as it did before the intervention of Father Walsh. And now, Sir, we will examine how your private account stands in this matter. Your whole case is, that the Catholics are not to be believed on oath. You glory in "Father Walsh's important admission," and in the vindication of the wisdom of our ancestors. You congratulate Mr. Canning" on the discovery so honourable "to the persons whose cause he supports, that "equivocation and mental reservation may be "applied to oaths of allegiance and suprema"cy;" you occupy four pages in showing in what manner this is to be effected; you occupy four more in proving it to be a doctrine of the Catholic church, that the Pope may pronounce * Letter I. p. 78. p. 77. + Letter I. p. 77. § Letter I. p. 79. when oaths cease to be binding, and may declare subjects absolved from them; and still another, in showing that priests may absolve from the guilt of perjury; and, notwithstanding all this, you spend two pages in a sort of commendatory examination of the security oaths* of 1813; you toil through seventeen pages over the oaths of 1825, and lament with sickly sensibility over every word and clause by which they fall short of the more honoured oaths of 1813; and still not satiated with all this labour bestowed on words which, when issuing from the mouth of a Catholic, you must consider to be empty air, you at p. 159, with prodigal liberality, favour us with a pet security oath of your own; respecting which you have the addi 串 I need hardly repeat that none of these oaths does, or can the sacramental test, form a part. Probably your gratuitous assumption, that every Article of Pius IV.'s Creed stands on the same grounds as transubstantiation, is intended to cover your new oath. This cannot apply to the second clause and, if it does apply to the first, you are involved in as great an absurdity as ever. How is a Catholic, however moderate, to forswear a doctrine "which, by the indis"pensable condition of his communion, he may not dissemble upon oath." The words are Father Walsh's. If his authority is good in one clause of the sentence, it is good in the other. You merely substitute one doctrine which may not be dissembled, for another which may not be dissembled. Your pretended security oath is, what the Sacramental Test always professed to be, an exclusion. 66 tional satisfaction of being assured, (and you state it as a strong recommendation,) that it will not satisfy, nay, that it will be offensive to those for whose use it is framed; in other words, that it will effectually prevent any measure, in which it is embodied, from "giving full effect "to the great object of the Union-that of tranquillizing Ireland and attaching it to this "country." Allow me the use of the words in which you courteously address Mr. Canning: Really, Sir, if the dignity of your station "and character did not forbid the supposition, "I should imagine, that you had no other purpose in recommending such provisions, than "to laugh at the whole proceeding. But, no; it 66 66 66 comes from you in very sober earnest."+ As to "the most charitable way of viewing the "whole matter," I find it somewhat difficult to discover it in your case, for my ingenuity only furnishes me with two solutions of your conduct. Take that which you prefer. I do not see how you can escape from the alternative. If you think the Catholics are to be believed on oath, you have brought a charge against them, which you consider to be false and malicious; if you think that they are not to be believed, all the importance which you attach to oaths is simulated for the occasion, and your lengthened discussions on them are undertaken for the mere * Letters, &c. &c. p. 33. + Letter I. p. 71. purpose of affixing a stigma on the character of Mr. Canning. My third and last corollary is that Mr. Pitt, who brought to his Sovereign's mind the improved principles of the Catholics, would not have encountered them as they have been encountered by you, and a good many of your clerical brethren in this controversy; and I have some doubts whether he would have bestowed the goodly gifts of the crown on those who did. He would not have met the liberal Catholic who came forward to disclaim the obnoxious tenets with the rebuff--Oh! no: you can't disclaim them. I prove to you, by Bull A. and Councils B. and C. that they are the tenets of your church, and by D. and E. that one of her fundamental doctrines is, that she is infallible. You must either hold the tenets or you are no Catholic. The man may be thus proved to be absurd, but not therefore necessarily insincere. On the ground of consistency he is checkmated. He has not a move. He ought either to take up the tenets or to lay down his religion. But perhaps rude bullying of this sort is not a very efficient engine of conversion. Mr. Pitt would have met the man with the hand of fellowship, and given him admission to parliament. He would have had no fear lest his protegé should relapse into the old doctrines, because the advance he had already made had been forced upon him by the lights |