he may have the protection of
the Pope, sends his Greek patriarch, Theophanes, to unite, in his name,
with the Latin church; but the Greek church disowns these bishops.

"In 1311 Pope Clement V. assembled a general council in the small town
of Vienne, in Dauphiny, in which he abolishes the order of the Templars.
It is here ordained that the Begares, Beguins and Beguines shall be
burned. These were a species of heretics '_to whom was imputed all that
had formerly been imputed to the primitive Christians_.'" So says
Voltaire. He does not, like the pitiful blaspheming infidels of to-day,
try to heap all this corruption of the dark ages upon primitive
Christianity. No! The hull of Voltaire's soul was too great for such a
deed.

"In 1414 the great council of Constance was assembled by an emperor who
resumes his rights, viz: by Sigismund. Here Pope John XXIII., convicted
of numerous crimes, is deposed, and John Huss and Jerome of Sprague
convicted of _obstinacy and burned_.

"In 1431 a council was held at Basle, where they in vain depose Pope
Eugene IV., who is too clever for the council. This was a stormy
council, and it is said that Eugene regretted in _his_ old age that he
ever left his monastery.

"In 1438 a council assembled at Ferrara, transferred to Florence, where
the excommunicated pope excommunicates the council, and declares it
guilty of high treason. Here a feigned union is made with the Greek
church, crushed by the Turkish synods held sword in hand.

"Pope Julius II. would have had his council of Lateran in 1512 pass for
an ecumenical council. In it that pope solemnly excommunicated Louis
XII., King of France, laid France under an interdict, summoned the whole
Parliament of Provence to appear before him, and excommunicated all the
philosophers because most of them had taken part with Louis XII. Yet
this council was not like that of Ephesus, called the council of
robbers.

"In 1537 the council of Trent was first assembled at Mantua, by Paul
III., afterwards at Trent, in 1543, and terminated in Dec., 1561, under
Pius VI." See vol. Phil. Dic.

"Pope Pius IX. convened a council in 1869, which in July, 1870, decreed
the _personal infallability of the Pope_ in matters of faith and morals,
to be a dogma of the church."

Reader, if you will digest this little piece of history, you will
doubtless discover good reasons for asserting the right of private
judgment and the liberty of conscience. _Truth stands true