between one or the other. In politics, in litterature, transactions and compromises are advisable, and indeed are ofter. the only thing possible; but in religion, in eternal truth, there are none. Notwithstanding Dr. Jelf, there will never be any via media between truth and error, between authority and rebellion, no more than there is between heaven and hell. If Fisher was right, then was Cranmer wrong; they cannot be both right, both the murderer and the victim. If Archbishop Plunkett was a martyr, then Archbishop Laud was not. If the Church of France is to be admired for having held out against schism through martyrdom and exile, then the Church of England must be blamed for having given way to schism. It is like the ostrich that thinks it saves itself from the hunter by refusing to look at him, to say that the present English Church is a holy although less distinguished branch of the Church than that of Rome. If the Church of Rome, when she maintains that out of her pale there is no salvation, and that she alone has the power of governing the Christian world, is not infallibly right, then she is infallibly wrong; and so far from being a distinguished branch of truth, she is founded on imposture or error; and in neither case can be a true Church. On the other hand, if the Church of England is not the only true Church on earth, then she is an apostate rebel.

There is only one sure way of passing from error to the one sure truth; that which St. Remigius showed to the first Christian king of France. When baptizing him, he said, << Bow thy head, proud Sicamber; burn what thou hast adored, and adore what thou hast burned. >>

It is true that to reconciled and forgiven rebellion may be granted certain privileges, as conformable to the weakness of a fallen Church. The Anglican Church may demand

what was granted in 1595 to the united Greeks of Poland -the degrading exception of a married clergy, and the use of the national language in the Liturgy. These concessions are not incompatible with the essentials of faith or authority; but they would make the re-united Church of England sadly different from what she was in the days of St. Dunstan or St. Anselm.

I am not a doctor, nor a minister of the Church; I am only her soldier, faithful though unworthy. But I can fearlessly assert that among the millions who belong, like me, to the Church of Rome, there is not one who, being led by leisure or duty to consider attentively what is now going on in England, would arrive at a different conclusion from mine. Seeing the profound ignorance which reigns among even the best informed Anglicans (such as Mr. Faber) on the feelings and duties of churchmen out of England-seeing also the furious prejudices which animate the new school against English and Irish Catholics, probably on the old pagan principle of Odisse quem læseris, I have presumed to think that it might not be quite useless to you to hear the opinion of a continental Catholic, than whom no one can be more interested in England's welfare, or more attentive to her present struggles. Fas est et ab hoste doceri.

Need I beg of you to acquit the warmth and asperity of my language of any intention of personal disrespect to you? No, surely not. I have much too high an opinion of you not to be certain that you will perfectly understand the motives that have dictated my words; and I hope that you will see on the contrary, a mark of deep respect on my part for your turn of mind and your personal character. I have written to you as to a man who knows the value of truth and the value of an immortal soul. I should certainly not have done so to most members of your schism. Although taught by conscience

and authority to look upon the Church of England as one of the most awful forms of sin and pride that have ever appeared in the world, I have loved and esteemed several of her children. I feel a compassionate sympathy for those of her ministers who know the weight of their present degradation. But, at the same time, I feel a most legitimate terror for the fate of their souls, when I see them, after having removed the rubbish which their forefathers had piled up to the very clerestory of the church, close their eyes against the light which, from the past and present, is now pouring down upon them. They are thus losing that invincible ignorance, which is the only reason which the Church admits for not belonging to her! This feeling has inspired me with the thought of thus writing to you. This feeling must plead my excuse, if I have wounded your feelings. Indeed, I wish I may have done so. Truth is a weapon intended to wound and destroy everything that is not truth. Non veni pacem mittere sed gladium. Convinced as I am that you do not belong, as you say I do, to a distinguished branch of the Church, but that you are in error, and that wilful error is mortal sin, I have spoken for the love of your immortal soul. If I have done so roughly, it is the roughness of love. Is there not more charity in pulling roughly back a man who is on his way to perdition, than in bowing him civilly on to the brink of the precipice?

This letter requires no answer. We are not called upon to carry on a controversy with each other. The ground on which we stand is unequal, and the odds between us would be uneven. To convert you, as well as all heretics, is and must be my desire, but not my province. To convert me can neither be your province nor your desire. You cannot look upon me as being in a state of rebellion, as I do you. What

would become of me, if I was to be convinced of the truth and right of the Church of England? I must then immediately doubt the truth and right of the Church of France, which acts and teaches the very reverse; for what is true and right on the north of the Channel cannot surely be otherwise on the south. And yet, according to the principles laid down by Mr. Faber and the British Critic, supposing myself convinced of the error and misconduct of my own Church, I must wait till she recognizes it herself, before I have a right to act up to what I think true, and to save my own soul. Alas! what a lamentable nondescript sort of thing I should be!

Our position is, therefore, quite different. The faith I profess, the authority I obey, the holy sacrifice of mass at which I assist, the very prayers I daily say, are fitted for you, for me, for the Portuguese ox-driver who is passing under our windows as well as for the savage who is at this moment being baptized in Oceania. Your faith, your spiritual superiors, your liturgy, can be of no use but to those who are English born and English bred. This shall be my last argument, for it would alone suffice to show which of us is the Catholic. You cannot, in conformity with your own doctrine, wish me to be what you are. I can, and indeed I must, wish you to be what I am. To you I can say, like Paul to Agrippa, «Opto apud Deum et in modico et in magno.. te.. hodie fieri talem qualis et ego sum exceptis vinculis his; » or rather as Bossuet beautifully modifies this text in speaking, I believe, to one of your own communion: Præsertim vinculis his, the bonds of faith, of obedience, of unity with the past, the present, and the future.

In conclusion, let me beg your acceptance of the enclosed papers, that will show you how the torrent of grace is

'Annals of Archconfraternity of the Holy and Immaculate heart of Mary.

384 LETTER TO A REVEREND MEMBER OF THE CAMDEN SOCIETY.

flowing among Romanists, and what are the fruits of Mariolatry. It is a good thing to write books, like Mr. Newman, about the miracles of the fourth century; but it is a better still to acknowledge and experience miracles in the nineteenth. Never, assuredly, were miracles more wanted than in these ages of light, and never I may say, were they more abundant; for can there be a greater miracle in the world than the sudden and mysterious conversions of sinners in an age like this?

May that Blessed Lady, who has been so long the object of the jeers and blasphemies of Anglican divines and Anglican travellers, and who seems now at last to inspire your countrymen with some degree of veneration-may she use her omnipotentia supplex to enlighten, to bless, and console you! Such will be for ever the prayer of your obedient servant and sincere well-wisher,

LE COMTE DE MONTALEMBERT.