ther is so young! Even the
Romanist ignores traditions more vast, antiquity more remote, a
literature of piety more grand. His temple suffocates: give us a
shrine still vaster; something than this Catholicism more catholic;
not the Church of Rome, but of God and Man; a Pantheon, not a
Parthenon; the true _semper, ubique, et ab omnibus_, the Religion of
the Ages, Natural Religion.

I was once in a foreign cathedral when, after the three days of
mourning, in Holy Week, came the final day of Hallelujah. The great
church had looked dim and sad, with the innumerable windows closely
curtained, since the moment when the symbolical bier of Jesus was
borne to its symbolical tomb beneath the High Altar, while the three
mystic candles blazed above it. There had been agony and beating of
cheeks in the darkness, while ghostly processions moved through the
aisles, and fearful transparencies were unrolled from the pulpit. The
priests kneeled in gorgeous robes, chanting, with their heads resting
on the altar steps; the multitude hung expectant on their words.
Suddenly burst forth a new chant, "Gloria in Excelsis!" In that
instant every curtain was rolled aside, the cathedral was bathed in
glory, the organs clashed, the bells chimed, flowers were thrown from
the galleries, little birds were let loose, friends embraced and
greeted one another, and we looked down upon a tumultuous sea of
faces, all floating in a sunlit haze. And yet, I thought, the whole of
this sublime transformation consisted in letting in the light of day!
These priests and attendants, each stationed at his post, had only
removed the darkness they themselves had made. Unveil these darkened
windows, but remove also these darkening walls; the temple itself is
but a lingering shadow of that gloom. Instead of its coarse and
stifling incense, give us God's pure air, and teach us that the
broadest religion is the best.

FOOTNOTES:

[A] This is Cudworth's interpretation, but he has rather strained the
passage, which must be that beginning, +Ouden oun oimai diapherein+
(Adv. Celsum, v.). The passages from Aristotle and Cleanthes are in
Stobaeus. Compare Maximus Tyrius, Diss. I.: +Theos heis panton basileus
kai pater+.

[B] Compare Augustine, De Vera Relig., c. iv.: "Paucis mutatis verbis
atque sententiis Christiani fierent." The Parsee creed is given as
above in a valuable article in Martin's Colonial Magazine, No. 18.

[C] See Vishnu Sarman (tr. by Johnson), pp. 16,