indulgence, (vi.), he concludes, (admitting however that the opposing argument cannot be easily answered), that the Pope cannot absolve himself immediate, but he can per alum id facere cui ipse potestatem tribuat-he can do it, indirecte ut per accidens subjectus sibi.* Chapter vii. is very observable. The author here explains, as much as he dares, what is meant by the temporal punishment from which an indulgence delivers but he says it is not natural punishment, it is not civil punishment. He is afraid to say what it is, that is, he is afraid of a test. His double, Dr. Doyle, at his examination already alluded to, was a little more explicit, but still sufficiently guarded: an indulgence might relieve from a particular bodily visitation, but he would not say what and when. The deliverance, however, is coram deo, otherwise the Church might appear materially to deceive-in re maxime gravi decipere videretur. Chapter iv. on the variety of indulgences, describes, with some approach to precision, the epithets applied to indulgences; it reports, as a solid opinion, Meeting with the word indirectè here, we cannot do better than notice in this place the quotation of Mr. G. from Dens's Theology, p. 46, to prove, that an indulgence does not remit guilt (culpa) directè. Perhaps Mr. G. may have to know that indirecte serves the purpose of papal policy, quite as well as directe. If he is acquainted with the controversy respecting the assumed right of his sovereign over all temporary things and persons, he must know how a right may be resigned, or even denied, directè, and asserted indirecte, with all the effect desired. Shakspeare was not unacquainted with the knavery and technicality of popish casuistry, as the 1st. scene in the Act III. of King John, and the speeches of the papal legate there plainly testify : "The better act of purposes mistook, Is, to mistake again; though indirect Mr. G. talks of the "much-vilified Dens." By whom is he vilified? Assuredly by those who ascribe to him alone, what, for the most part, he has barely repeated from the most venerated Rabbis of Rome. If any allusion is intended to certain foul disclosures, which the pages of Dens have furnished, and if Mr. G. wish to insinuate a stigma upon those who have thought it their duty to make those disclosures public, let him tremble at the just reflection, that the deepest and most righteous abhorrence which he would inspire on the subject, is no sooner expressed, than instantly, palpably, and with all its terrific force, it recoils upon himself, Dr. Murray, and his Church. It is alleged, that in practice the clerical bachelors, who enact the part of confessors, are very moderate and decorous in the exercise of their prerogative. But what does the Church provide for? What does the Church suggest? What does the Church command? Consult Bailly, one of the principal Maynooth class-books: then consult Dens, the "surest guide" of the Irish clergy. that the plenissima adjungat absolutionem non solum a pœna, sed etiam culpa, saltem veniali-something to do with sin. Here, like others, the author doubts whether days in this world and in purgatory have a common measure. Some, he says, deny the thousand years' pardon: doubts there are likewise about the common adjunct in articulo mortis. Chapter x. teaches, that it is safer to satisfy oneself than to trust to indulgences; but safest to do both. There are two curious doubts: one is, whether a jubilee absolution, in a reserved case, the condition not being performed, is valid? The common answer he says is, that it is valid, (rata), quoniam absolutio non pendet a futura conditione, neque pendere potest. Is this a general rule? The other is, if in hope of a future jubilee, a person fall into a reserved sin, can he be absolved? Some deny, others affirm, as Navarre. Jub. Not. 34, num. 4 et 6., Cor. dub. qu. 37 de indulgentiis, prop. 3, and OTHERS. In Chapter xii. appears the celebrated question, Tantum valent, &c. concerning which there are various opinions; as likewise the xivth and last chapter informs us there are respecting the operation of indulgences on the defunct: six opinions are discussed. We have now done except some reflections. We shall be surprised if it do not appear to the attentive reader of the foregoing expositions of doctrine on an important subject, by the choicest sons of an unerring and exclusively united church, that, whatever else they exhibit, they do not exhibit a "harmony of confessions." It will likewise appear, that in the transactions connected with indulgences, there has uniformly been displayed a very sensitive regard to money. Denarii, Oboli, and if we go to the Pænitentiaria,* Burchardus's especially, solidi, and all other denominations of coin, seem to be incorporated with the absolution of human crime in all its forms and degrees. The enormous pardons contained in many indulgences are not only admitted, however unwillingly in some instances, as genuine, but their very foundation in the absolute discipline of canonical penance is established-in this way proving by accounting for them. For a moderate sinner might soon get in debt a thousand years of penance, for which a millenary pardon was just the discharge he wanted! Would his church, the tenderest of mothers, and the richest in spiritual wealth of fathers, be so flinty-hearted as to see his distress, and hear his supplications, without extending a helping hand, manus adjutrices porrigens especially when that hand would not return empty? But the main inference and improvement from the preceding detail is derived from the repeated appearance and anxious discussion of the phrase relative to the meaning and value of To say nothing of the Tax at present. * indulgences-Tantum valent, quantum sonant-in its different forms. And the question, which, as it appears, can only be answered in one way, is, whether this does not express a belief, and a prevailing belief, that the documents concerned were to be understood literally. For, in the outset, who were persons to receive these indulgences? Were they the educated alone, who might be fortified against false or extravagant expectations, grounded on the unmeasured pretensions of the spiritual bills put into their hands, by their rather exclusive knowledge of the technicalities of their church, and likewise by their own authority, as authorised guides in many cases, to interpret the grants in their own way? No: far enough from it: they must have been generally the uneducated, and that at a time when education and learning were inconceivably less diffused than they have been in more modern times, and than they are now. They must have been the majority. And perhaps we are not to confine ourselves to that class. All the sincere and devoted members of a presumed unerring church must in conscience have gone straight forward to the literal meaning. For consider how they were circumstanced. Large and unlimited spiritual promises were formally and solemnly made on the credit of that church and her highest authorities. Could their church, the sole depository of sanctity and truth, deceive the faithful? knowingly, wilfully, and deliberately, deceive her most devoted children! for she must know, that they felt themselves bound by duty, as well as by affection, to believe, that their great, their divine, oracle would not, could not, lie, and lie to them! This is just the dilemma in which they would be placed, if even a passing doubt occurred or was suggested. And this plainly accounts for the intimations which rather charily, but still in satisfactory abundance, ooze out from the grave and learned discussions in the preceding pages, respecting deception-pious fraud-the mother's apple. In short, the intelligent dealers in the commodities which we have been considering, knew perfectly well how the matter stood. They knew, that a gross imposition was practised and meant to be practised upon the superstition and credulity of those who were nurtured in that superstition and credulity-the weaker portion of the flock; but they themselves were so enchained by the credit and power, as well as the pomp and emoluments, of their ecclesiastical situation, that they supported the delusion-a delusion of the most deleterions description, with their utmost influence; and while, in the face of a conscience burning within them, with the guilt of their hypocrisy, they thus promoted the sweeping falsehood, they satisfied themselves as well as they could, by logical conundrums and technicalities, which absolutely nullified the divine trea sures, pompously enough announced on the minor public occasions, but proclaimed by sound of trumpet in what Rome impiously denominates her own sacred year of expiation. The state of the case is plainly and briefly this. In the Church of Rome, and among its pillars, there are two main parties, however subdivided, on the subject discussed. The first may be called the Literals, as the other may be called the Figuratives, or (why not rather) the Technicals? The first contend that unless their mode of interpretation be adopted, their church must lie, hopeless of relief, under the imputation of solemn and intentional deception! The second answer-not very harmoniously as to the mode—in the best way they can; and truly they do not spare either labour or ingenuity. The looker-on will make his conclusion. We now lay down the pen for the present, having confined ourselves more than we need have done for proof of the Church of Rome's Traffic in Pardons, to her indulgences, respecting the meaning of which we believe, that they were throughout, except what refer to simple relaxations of penance, a known and intended imposition upon the credulity of the world—an imposition only less put in use in modern times, because there is less credulity in the human mass to work upon. We conclude with every charitable and benevolent feeling towards Mr. Green, but we might tell him that he will find some difficulty, unless his future technicalities stand him in better stead than his past, in proving, that the middle member of the first sentence of his title, "THE WHOLE TRUTH," has been very scrupulously attended to, in his attack upon the Catholic Archdeacon of Stafford and sole Vicar of Colwich. Our best wish of all in his behalf is, that he would keep his promise, and for that purpose request the use of Mr. Hodson's pulpit. Nothing would be to us a matter of more cordial joy than thus to witness the return of a respectable member of an erring church to the bosom of a true Catholic Church. He would then be no longer encumbered either with his own technicalities, or with the technicalities of his Dominus dominorum, who can sometimes call himself Servus servorum. Why, when the door of deliverance is open before him, should he hesitate to enter? Why. Technis per servulum! -falli se sinat Terent. Heaut. iii. i. 69. Why does he not-why should he not-break the spell and the chains; and asserting the liberty with which Christ makes his people free, for ever disentangle himself from the vitiating and destructive yoke of bondage and delusion which spiritual Rome, in her present constitution, is bound to impose upon all her subjects. 145 ART. VI.-The Speeches of Lord Brougham. Lately published The Philological Museum and Quarterly Journal of Education. No longer published. The Critical Works and The Correspondence of Bentley. Not yet published. AT the close of our Article in No. VII. p. 125, we stated that we should probably resume the subject, and bring down the history of the "Rise and Progress of English Scholarship" to the time when its last rays were seen to linger on the deathbed of Peter Paul Dobree. Of course, we are aware that some living scholars could be named, such as the patriarchal Routh, the guileless Kidd, and the laborious Gaisford, together with Bishops Blomfield, Butler, Coplestone, Kaye, Maltby, and Monk; to say nothing of Drs. Arnold, Bloomfield, Cardwell, Cramer, Giles, Rose, and Stocker; and Messrs. Bailey,* Barker, Burges, Clinton, Dunbar, Dyce, Hare, Hamilton, Cornwall Lewis, Mitchell, Granville Penn, Seager, Tate, Thirlwall, Walpole, * To this gentleman, who gained golden opinions for his early academic carcer, and subsequently by the English edition of the Dictionary of Facciolati, we owe a recent reprint of Dalziel's Analecta Minora; to which he has prefixed a dissertation on the Digamma, with a view of shewing, as Bentley suggested, and Thiersch confirmed, that the letter, which once existed in Greece, but was afterwards lost, has been preserved in the great family of the Teutonic tongues. Of Mr. Bailey's work a review may be seen in the "Gentleman's Magazine," from the pen of his old and affectionate master, the Canon Tate, formerly of R.S. Y. but now of S. P. L. Since Mr. Bailey's retirement from the head-mastership of the Free School, Cambridge, he has been occupied, we hear, upon an edition of the Greek Comic Fragments, which is to be more full than the similar one of the Rev. Ř. Walpole, published some thirty years ago. To this clever writer, whose articles we have long missed in the "Quarterly," to which they were a no little ornament, we are disposed to attribute the one in the last number, "On the Life and Writings of Horace." But as all internal evidence, touching the parentage of a paper, has been ridiculed by Pope's "Who can't but smile, When every blockhead knows me by my style?" we forbear to give our reasons for identifying the present writer with the illustrator, rather than the editor, of Aristophanes. "Where no external evidence is to be had," said Bentley to Barnes, "we must rely on internal alone: and there every man passeth sentence according to the measure of his learning and sagacity." Be the writer then Mr. Mitchell, or not, we are surprised he did not see, that |