professions; in consequence of which the advantage or mischief consequent upon their several modes of action, is chargeable upon their creeds, not limited to the character of the individual. The author gives an advantage, as must be expected from every partizan, to his own side, and represents the Papist as at length yielding to the force of truth, and dying in heart a Protestant. This, indeed, appears a necessary consequence from the hypothesis of the author; it being, perhaps, impossible for two persons acting, with candid minds and sincere intentions, on opposite principles, to maintain intercourse together, for any length of time, without discovering, sooner or later, which is the weaker cause; and therefore the work would not only have been tame and insipid, but not founded in the nature of things, without some such result. At the same time we admit, that, according to the old fable of the lion and the man, it would have been easy for a Roman Catholic to construct the characters and plot on such a foundation as would have led to a contrary conclusion. In these cases, the fable is not argument. It is only a collection of seeming probabilities, of which the judgment and observation of the reader must decide whether they be only apparent or real. The plot of the tale is as follows: ---The Montagues and Clarenhams are two neighbouring and connected families; the former Protestants, the latter Papists; and to heighten the contrast, the Protestants are Calvinistic Presbyterians. We think this latter part of the invention injudicious, as the contrast between the essential principles of Protestantism and Popery would be best seen if no other diversity perplexed the attention. The period selected for the story is the year 1715, when "the rebellion, in favour of the house of Stuart, was on the eve of breaking forth both in Scotland and in the north of England." Mr. Clarenham having died, his only son was sent upon the continent with Mr. Dormer, otherwise called Father Clement, a Jesuit, for his tutor. On his return it was arranged that the Jesuit should eventually succeed Mr. Elliston, otherwise called Father Dennis, in the situation of domestic chaplain to Mrs. Clarenham's family. The arrival of young Clarenham brings about a visit from his former companion, the eldest son of Sir Herbert Montague; and the interviews which afterwards take place between these two families, united in affection, but divided in faith, furnish occasion for those exhibitions of the tendency of the two creeds, which it is the object of the tale to produce. The first scene of interest, in which these discussions occur, is the chapel of the Clarenhams, where a portrait of St. Francis gives rise to a disquisition on the subject of fasting. Mrs. Clarenham said of that popish saint to Ernest Montague, "It was fastings, and mortification, and penance, which reduced him to that ema ciated state.' “They see there no injunction whatever about fasting,' replied Ernest and the fasting which is commended in the New Testament forbids any such display of its effects as that '-pointing to the emaciated painting. Our Lord himself says, 'When ye fast, be not as the hypocrites, of a sad countenance, for they disfigure their faces that they may appear unto men to fast. Verily I say unto you, they have their reward. But thou, when thou fastest, anoint thy head and wash thy face, that thou appear not unto men to fast, but unto thy Father which seeth in secret; and thy Father which seeth in secret shall reward thee openly.' "Dormer listened with fixed attention, as Ernest gravely and emphatically repeated the words of Christ. his countenance and manner assuming an worship, in the following descripexpression of polished mildness. And tion. do not suppose, Mr. Montague, that I mean to question in how far those of your communion thus fast; but allow me to say, that our Catholic and Apostolic Church has shewn her heavenly wisdom in the care she has taken that none of her children shall neglect the performance of this holy duty; and those who have, as that saint did (pointing to the picture), far exceeded the injunctions of his church, in fasts and other mortifications, have attained to that angelical degree of purity which makes them glorious models for us, and which has, according to the decision of the church, given them such favour with God, as to encourage us to trust in the efficacy of their intercessions for us.' 666 “All—all absolutely contrary to Scripture,' replied Ernest, with deep seriousness of voice and manner. Those open, known, stated, prescribed fasts, meritorious in proportion to the degree in which they disfigure, and emaciate, and make useless the human frame, and the neglect of which subjects the person to punishment from his church, are in direct contradiction to that private act of devotion and humiliation, known only to God and the soul, which is commended by the Lord and Head of the true church: and the belief that the intercession of the spirits of men can avail us any thing, besides the many absurdities it involves, is in absolute opposition to the plainest declarations of Scriptures. St. Paul "I do not speak Latin in the presence of ladies,' said Ernest, turning away from the priests; but,' addressing Clarenham, 'you will find the passage I meant to quote in St. Paul's Epistle to Timothy,' (chap. ii. v. 5.)" pp. 40-43. The progress of this argument, it will be allowed, is well managed; and the appeal to the authority of the church, and the rejection of all unauthorized versions are perfectly in character. Afterwards Ernest Montague attends Divine service in the chapel, being provided with a post of observation, where he might, unseen, notice all that passed. Our readers will think he has not done injustice to that study of effect, which charactizes Roman-Catholic "The chapel was nearly full of people— all, at that moment, kneeling on the pavement in profound silence every eye turned with apparently intense devotion on the painting over the altar. It was that crucifixion which had so powerfully moved Ernest's feelings on his former visit to the chapel. Amongst the worshippers were Mrs. Clarenham, her son, and two daughters, kneeling also devoutly on the pavement, with their eyes fixed on the painting, Dormer knelt near the altarhis hands clasped on his breast, and his eyes fixed with an expression of adoration on the suffering, but beautifully resigned and affecting, countenance of the picture. Elliston was in the pulpit." pp. 111, 112. "Ernest's thoughts were at last interrupted, and the profound silence in the chapel broken, by Dormer, as he knelt, repeating, in a voice of thrilling power, the words addressed to the thief upon the cross, Verily, I say unto thee, To-day shalt thou be with me in paradise.' Elliston then began, in a strain of most vehement declamation, to call the attention of the people to these words. Some things he said were good, and Ernest listened to them with pleasure; but the old man, before he concluded, had worked up his own and the people's feelings to a state with which Ernest could feel no emotion of sympathy. He and they were in tears; and the chapel resounded with audible sobs. Dormer, he however observed, was not moved: neither were Clarenham and Maria; but Catherine and her mother were deeply so. "Just as Elliston finished, the chapel began to darken. Ernest looked towards the large Gothic window by which it was lighted, and saw a thick curtain gradually descending over it. This, he supposed, was meant to represent that miraculous darkness which accompanied the last sufferings on the cross; and he felt shocked by an imitation which appeared to him so profane. Soon all was in the gloom of departing twilight-all but the painting. A lamp suspended above it, which Ernest had not before observed, now shed its pale rays on the countenance, giving it still more the expression of suffering and exhaustion, and throwing on the figure the pallidness of death. The darkness seemed to affect the people as if it had been real. A sensation among them, as if gathering together, had a powerful effect on Ernest's feelings. This was increased by Dormer's voice, proceeding from the darkened altar, and pronouncing the next sacred words uttered by Christ. These again called forth a vehement burst of declamation from Elliston. Another and another sentence was thus pronounced by Dormer, and declaimed on by Elliston; and Ernest began to feel wearied of the sameness of his exaggerated expressions, and thought of retiring, when, after another pause of deep silence, the next sentence was pronounced, not by Dormer, but by Elliston; and then Dormer began, not like old Elliston, with vehement, and unstudied, and ineloquent appeals to the feelings of his hearers, but in a voice, calm, low, and thrilling, to explain the words, and point out the instructions to be derived from them. Ernest's attention was completely arrested: but it required more than even Dormer's eloquence,-though every sentence seemed the result of study and of conviction,- -to prove what he attempted to prove. The words he preached on were those addressed by Christ to his disciple John, on consigning to him the care of his mother :- - Behold thy mother.' The Evangelist simply adds, as the consequence of this charge- And from that hour that disciple took her unto his own home.' Dormer, from these words, attempted to defend the worship of the Virgin Mary; and this, apparently, with the most perfect sincerity." pp. 113–116. Though Ernest could not agree in any thing Dormer said on this point, still he felt no inclination to depart. At last he was rewarded for his long attendance. Elliston pronounced the words, It is finished.' And never in his life before had Ernest heard eloquence so powerful, as that by which Dormer clearly, and from Scripture, proved, that, at the moment these words were uttered, the stupendous work of redemption was finished. Ernest covered his face with his hands, that he might see none of those degrading appeals to the senses, by which the powerful preacher was surrounded. When he again raised his eyes, on Dormer's concluding, the darkness was dispelled. The congregation still knelt; and, as if to do away the impression produced by the scriptural and instructive truths he had just uttered, Dormer began to repeat rapidly some Latin prayers, while his fine and expressive countenance, which had been lighted up by the deep feeling of those important truths, gradually sunk into an expression of the most excessive exhaustion and languor; and Ernest, supposing the service near a close, softly left the gallery, and, deep in thought, bent his steps homewards. "What a mixture of error and truth!' thought he, as he slowly crossed the park." pp. 117, 118. The eldest Miss Clarenham had been led, by her frequent intercourse with the Montagues, to suspect the soundness of some of the tenets of the Church of Rome; and she had thence been induced to be more negligent than other members of her family in the practice of confession. Father Clement was discon certed by this neglect; and after several fruitless attempts to procure a private interview, he accosted her one morning, by demanding a few minutes' conversation with her,-in the course of which he was since she had "asked how long it confessed. "Maria hesitated. Not for a very long time, Father. The truth is,' added she, a little recovered from her alarm at finding herself at last compelled to have a private conversation with Dormer, the truth is, Father, that I have ever had the greatest repugnance to confession. I could scarcely overcome it with good old Father Dennis, whom I regarded as a parent.' "That repugnance is sinful, my daugh. ter; and, like other sins, the more you indulge it, the more difficulty you will find in subduing it.' "But, Father, if I confess my sins to God?-He only can pardon them.' "God pardons those in his church through the medium of his priests, daughter. The church says expressly, 'A penitent person can have no remission of sins but by supplication to the priest.' "Does the Bible say so, Father?' "Dormer looked surprised, but said mildly, I am not in the habit of hearing it asked whether the Church is supported by any authority in its decrees but its own?' "But if the church decrees what is contrary to the Bible?' "Dormer looked still more surprised. 'You are on dangerous ground, daughter, I have suspected that some serious error withheld you from attending to your Christian duties. I now perceive the cause of your unwillingness to confess; but beware, my daughter, of suffering your heart to be hardened by unbelieving thoughts regarding the power of the church. Remember that Christ himself said to his Apostles,- Whose soever sins ye remit, they are remitted; and also, whose soever sins ye retain, they are retained.' That power is still in the church; and how awful must the state of that person be, on whose own guilty head the church retains his sins!' "These words, but still more the solemn tone in which Dormer pronounced them, made Maria cold all over, and her limbs tremble. "Dormer perceived the impression his words had made, and continued: How dangerous, my daughter, is the very first step in error! Some enemy of the truth has sown the poisonous seed of unbelief in your heart. I have seen you, daughter, delighted with the cavils of a heretic. I have seen you turn looks of contempt on the pictures of those saints who now reign in heaven and, last of all, you have scorned the ministrations of the priest commissioned by the church to teach you the way of life. Daughter, you ought to tremble.'" pp. 124-127. The conversation closes by her delivering up to her confessor a Bible, which she had met with a secret opportunity of purchasing; and with the truths of which she had so far imbued her mind, that even the loss of it did not restore those feelings of implicit and undoubting reverence with which she had previously regarded every word of her appointed pastor. A Bible indeed was afterwards presented to her in a very unexpected manner; and she welcomed it with a warmth, which increased her attachment to the doctrines which she had imbibed from it. She did not indeed, all at once, divest herself of her prepossessions in favour of the church in which she had been educated. But her doubts increased, and led to a result on which the story hinges. There was another family, attached to the cause of Rome, in the neighbourhood. It was that of Sir Thomas Carysford. The parents had betrothed, at an early age, the eldest son of Sir Thomas, to the eldest Miss Clarenham, conformably to the will of her uncle, General Clarenham, which made it necessary that, previously to her marriage, she should declare herself a RomanCatholic. The Protestant feelings, with which she was now beginning to be actuated, naturally awakened doubts of her fulfilling this condition; and, to secure a point so much desired in both families, a visit is contrived to the Carysfords, with whom the superior of the English Jesuits resided as domestic chaplain. This ambitious and enterprising priest contrives to have the young heir of the house of Clarenham, though just returned from abroad, dispatched on a confidential errand to the Pretender, and thence to Rome, where the freedom of his remarks on religion brings him within the power of the inquisition; while, at the same time, a bull is procured from Rome, wherein CHRIST. OBSERV. No. 291. "his holiness, as General Clarenham left him a power in his will to do so, makes it necessary that Miss Clarenham chooses to dispense with that clause which should be of age before the union of the two families, and wills that union to take place without delay." p. 241. No artifices are left untried, to give effect to this arrangement. But it fails. Miss Clarenham, in the presence of several priests, "avowed her determination to receive her faith only from the Bible, read by herself, in a language she understood. On the same day Catherine professed herself a humble member of the Church of Rome. In a few weeks it was decided that Maria was no longer heiress of her uncle's fortune-which devolved on Catherine." p. 362. Nevertheless, young Carysford does not even so surrender his claim to the hand of Miss Clarenham; and they are married without any restrictions on the faith or conduct of the lady. The part of the narrative, however, which most puts to the proof the subjection of a Romish priest to the most unwarrantable commands which may be conveyed to him from his ecclesiastical superior, is that which regards the honourable exile of young Clarenham. The task of concerting his departure is committed to Dormer by the superior of his order. He was a man by no means fitted, by personal character or habit, for the execution of so stern an office. : "Wherever any one resided, however neighbourhood, Dormer had poor, or in the meanest hovel, in the visited them all. He appointed different houses, where the old and infirm, or sickly, might with ease come to him to confess. Particular times were set apart for one or other mode of instruction in the Romish faith in short, nothing was heard of at the castle, or in the village, or amongst the cottagers, but the zeal and sanctity of of his personal devotion was guessed to the new chaplain. The extreme strictness be equal to his zeal for the souls of his flock, but of this he made no display. It was known only to himself and to his God. No inmate of the castle, however, though perhaps detained to a late hour out of bed, ever saw the light in Dormer's window extinguished; and the attendant who performed the few services he required, however early he offered them in the morning, found him already at study or devotion." pp. 122, 123. Z He however submits, and, notwithstanding his knowledge of the perfidy to which he is an unwilling party, endeavours to subdue those natural feelings of repugnance which he cannot suppress, as acts of rebellion against his holy mother church. This part of the fiction is well contrived: we cannot pursue it into detail. Suffice it to say, that the internal conflict which Dormer undergoes, in this steady adherence to principles subversive of his peace, undermines his health, and, when added to the mortifications which he, from that cause, deems it a duty to render more severe, brings him to a premature grave!-Ernest Montague, becoming acquainted with the terrible situation of his friend, Clarenham, and having reason to conceive, that these priests alone are able to extricate him from it, is brought into close communication with the dying Dormer, who learns to value the piety even of a heretic, and to converse with him confidentially on his hopes and fears for eternity. We extract one passage from this scene. among his other mortifications, lays himself in a coffin, for which singular mode of preparation he assigns the following reason :— Dormer, "I felt a strange shrinking from the foolish gloomy accompaniments of death,' resumed Dormer, in consequence, I suppose, of my weak state of body; and, as you know it is my way to use means for the attainment of the ends I wish, I had this brought here, (pointing to the coffin,) to familiarize myself to what long association has rendered so much an object of gloom; and even that association I have found wonderfully powerful in giving to this last depository the greatest effect in solemnizing the thoughts." "It does indeed,' replied Ernest, relieving his breast by a long drawn, heavy sigh. "Yes,' continued Dormer, when lay myself in this coffin for my hours of rest, and all is dark around me, and I feel its narrow bounds,-and recollect all that is combined with being laid in it for my last long sleep-Oh! my thoughts are too, too clearly on the verge of eternity, I could sometimes pray even for annihilation-the future seems so awfully momentous! The question-Am I safe? without an answer. The past so worthless, so mispent, so inconceivably, so madly regardless of the bearing time must have upon eternity!' "Ernest fixed his eyes intently on Dor mer. 66 6 And at such moments,' asked he, on what can you rest your hope? Do those penances-those self-inflictionsthose acts of charity-those pious feelings and endeavours, which your church teaches are to secure your justification at the bar of Christ, return to your recollection so as to give you courage to meet your Judge, with feelings of peace and security?' 666 The church teaches that it is best for the departing soul not to be secure,' replied Dormer. "But may I ask you to answer my question, at least with regard to hope, if not security?' said Ernest. "Yes, provided you do not take my who are really holy men in the Catholic answer as one which would apply to those Church. For me, no penance—no mortification-no fasting-no means I have ever attempted, and I believe few ever have attempted more, who had to support the external character imposed on our order, nothing has succeeded. Sin still reigns, mingles, triumphs in all I do, and seems to laugh at every effort I make to overcome it. On looking back, therefore, in those awful moments, nothing returns but sin.' “In what, then, my dear sir, do you find a refuge from despair?' "'Tis strange,' replied Dormer, how at such moments, one doctrine of our faith stands forth so as to throw all the others into distance and insignificance.The vastness of that sense of want felt by the soul seems instinctively to cling to the infinite vastness of the means appointed by God to supply it. The death of the Son of God seems alone sufficient to blot out sins so aggravated and innumerable : - -the righteousness of the Son of God alone so spotless as to answer the demands of the perfect law of God. Christ is seen to have wrought the work alone,--and then the soul asks-for whom was it wrought? For man.-for all men,-for whosoever will: and for a time, a glorious triumphant moment, the soul forgets all but its Almighty Saviour, and its own safety,and can say My Lord, my Saviour, my hope, my all.' My own righteousnesses, when I remember them in the light of that spotless holiness, appear as a covering of filthy rags. Purge away their filth as thou wilt, I lay myself wholly into thy hands.' "You are, my dearest sir, in those triumphant glorious moments, a Calvinist, a Bible Christian,' exclaimed Ernest, an expresion of joy lighting up his counteYou once asked me whether Calvinists could believe a Roman Catholic might be truly and devotedly religious: at this moment I do.' nance. |