EPITAPHS.

THE

CATHOLIC MAGAZINE,

For August, 1812.

Stand fast in the liberty wherewith Christ has made us free, and be not entangled again in the yoke of bondage. Gal. v. 1.

PREFACE.

EVER since the publication of the first Number, a deluge

of insulting anonymous letters have been sent to my house, beside personal invectives received, galling enough to discountenance the most resolute and persevering mind, viz. "That the Magazine is a scrawl-a trash-foreign lan 66 guage-written by a layman, unauthorised of deciding “ upon doctrines-insulting and offensive to the Protestants "and the French clergy-dangerous and obstructive to "Catholic emancipation-an old woman's tautology, more "calculated to do harm than good to religion," &c. &c. besides an interdiction laid upon it.

The painful sensations which those proceedings have produced in my mind, and the scandal it has occasioned to my family, have been greatly alleviated by the written approbation and encouragement given to its continuation by some of the most learned and orthodox clergy, saying, that "The Magazine shows spirit, method, and intelligence, no "less than zeal and orthodoxy," &c. &c. These testimonies I preserve as relics of consolation to my disturbed mind.

With regard to my being a layman, so was the famous Thomas Ward, author of the Errata to the Protestant Bible; his Cantos, or England's Reformation, &c.: so is Dr. M'Cartan, author of the original and inimitable work under the humble title of the CHRISTIAN ALPHABET. The most orthodox controversial writer in my country was a journey, man weaver, named Arnold Vangeluwe, born at Ardoye, No. 1.

F

in Flanders. He had a wife and several children; he wrote thirty volumes, generally approved of by the Catholic clergy. Some of his admirable works may be seen in my library, with a list of real names converted by his evident demonstrations of the Church of Jesus Christ. The Hollanders, chiefly sect-ministers, were then, and I believe still are, so much enraged and confounded at the veracity of his writings, that a Catholic young man at Sluys, named Peter Waas, being detected with one of these volumes in his possession, was publicly whipped, and the book burnt by the hands of the executioner.*

I have no presumption to imagine, that my small abilities can be brought into competition with any of those highlyfavoured authors, neither with any of the ancient or modern Catholic writers; yet when I reflect that our Saviour made use of spit and mud to give sight to the blind and speech to the dumb; that the Almighty has chosen the weak things of the world, to confound those which are mighty; Cor. that not long ago a Rev. D. L. H. was reconciled to the Catholic church, which he had forsaken, by the admonition of a girl of eleven years old; who knows, I say, if the Almighty, in his goodness, may not crown with success my feeble endeavours? Has God not made foolish the wisdom of this world?

In this

I have been told that I have offended the Protestants of all denominations; if so, I repent, but I have reason to doubt this imputation; for those Protestant Ministers who have honoured me with their visits, after having bought and perused the Magazine, have treated me in the most liberal and generous manner I could wish; the hardest term some of them made use of is, that it was severe. Country I have been protected, supported, and earned a creditable livelihood; and I have now the happiness of living in habits of intimacy and friendship with several of the most creditable and pious Protestant families, who employ me in my profession, and are subscribers to my Magazine, and several creditable Protestant booksellers expose it generously for sale.

It would surely be very wrong in me to come to a coun

* There is an unbounded liberty of consience in Holland, except for the Catholics, who are there unmercifully persecuted. On a Sunday no one can enter a Catholic chapel, without paying to two Protestant porters, who are at the entrance, whatever they are pleased to impose upon one, having a dis cretionary power to that effect. No money, no Mass, as they say; geen Geld, geen Messe.

try, where liberty of conscience is granted, and where I and thousands of other Catholics enjoy the blessings of following undisturbed our religious tenets, to disquiet the consciences of others; I would rather exclaim with Dr. O'Leary, "Let the gates of civil and religious toleration be thrown "open to all Adam's children, whose principles are not in"consistent with the peace of civil society, or subversive to "the rules of morality, and wrench the poignard, so often "tinged with human blood, from the hand of persecution; "to sheath the sword which misguided zeal has drawn in "defence of a gospel which recommends peace and love; "to restore to man the indelible charter of his temporal "rights, which no earthly power has ever been commis"sioned by Heaven to deprive him of on account of his "mental errors; to re-establish the empire of peace, over"thrown so often by religious feuds; and cement all mortals, especially Christians, in the ties of social harmony, by establishing toleration on its proper basis."

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My sole aim in this undertaking, as also of my literary friends, is to remove, or at least diminish, those numberless false fabricated notions and prejudices forged against Catholics, so deeply rooted in the minds of many seeming well-informed Protestants, and as infused, drop by drop, from early infancy, by lists of Popish abominations, fees, pecuniary absolutions, indulgencies, Fox's romancing Martyrology, and the whole train of controvertible artillery, all pointed at the Catholic faith. The lists of indulgencies, absolutions, and fees of the Pope's Chancery or Rome, a great custom-house for sins, as printed in Guthrie's Grammar, is not only too ridiculous to be believed by any people in their senses, but is too disgusting and indecent to be read by persons who are not entirely lost to shame and conscience. It appears wonderful to me, that that famous DE TAXA S. CANCELLARIA APOSTOLICE, should have been issued by a Pope, and in a year when all Europe was still in a certain state of barbarity and ignorance, and that learning abstractedly prevailed in Rome and its dependencies, when no education or science was to be obtained but in the Italian states, even as far as Elizabeth ;* and that the most enlightened part of Catholic Europe could have been duped in a document which taught, that, in paying 7s. 6d. it absolved the murder of father and mother, wife, sister, or brother!!! &c. &c. Nature revolts at the thought; it stands a disgrace to English

* Alfred the Great, and numberless others, were educated at Rome, as the only place where any learning was to be acquired in Europe.

literature, and blots out, all at once, in a thinking mind, all other anti-catholic accusations. I was lately asked by two gentlemen of veracity and liberal education, at what annual expense I and my family might be for priestly absolutions and indulgences? Good God! what answer can be given to such questions in this pretended enlightened age? A Catholic priest scorns the idea of simony. My wife, before her conversion, might have imbibed as much nonsense; but, thanks to Heaven! her eyes are opened; she knows now that our clergy have hard duties to perform, and are exposed to be called out night or day; and instead of receiving money for absolution or indulgences, are often under the necessity of dividing their scanty stipend with the indisposed poor, unless assisted by opulent Catholics.

There are numberless profound Catholic works, which evidently and judiciously refute all those ungenerous prejudices propagated against Catholics; but those books are never bought by Protestants, and consequently never read by them; they are represented as being dangerous, and not fit to be perused by Protestants. I have been asked if there existed a Catholic Catechism, to instruct its members in the tenets of their belief! When the beautiful Poor Man's Catechism is put into their hands, at the first glance they immediately shut it up again, as fearful of meeting the truth, and disturbing their consciences. For my part, I have read from my very youth all the controversial books, in different languages, against the Catholics, that I could procure; and I have always found, that the more I read such works, the more I was strengthened in my Roman Catholic faith. I am now in possession of the most violent anti-catholic writers, and they are never withheld from my family or Catholic connexions. He who sees but one side of the question, is like the champions in the Spectator; they fell to fighting, because each saw but one side of the gold and silver shield.

My mind is so much filled with matter on this subject, that I could fill a whole magazine with it; but the reproach made by some of my Catholic friends, (not meaning to flatter me,) that I am as tautologic in my writings as an old woman, lies so deeply impressed in my thoughts, that it seems an old woman is constantly glimmering before my eyes, like a phantasmagoric figure, which brings to my recollection of cutting short, in order to bring forward the performances of my worthy learned friends; and in future I shall endeavour to weather out storms and affronts, like so many drops of cold water falling upon a duck's back.