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any man, and I think quite as highly of a Catholic as of a Protestant;
but if on a man's faith there be founded a scheme of political
influence, then we have a right to inquire in to that scheme. And I
cannot contemplate the doctrines of absolution, of confession, and of
indulgences, without having a strong suspicion that these doctrines are
maintained for the purpose of confirming the authority and influence
which man exercises over man. What is it to me, whether that authority
be called spiritual, or otherwise, if practically it influence man
in his conduct in society? Is it because religious doctrines are made
subservient to worldly and political purposes, that they are therefore
to be excluded from the consideration of the legislature in the
discussion of the present question? On the contrary, if the authority
derived from these doctrines be only the stronger on account of their
being borrowed from religion, and misapplied to worldly purposes, that,
in my opinion, furnishes an additional motive for closely investigating
the doctrines themselves. When I find the pope issuing bulls to the
Irish Catholic bishops, and such documents sent forth to four or five
millions of people who possessed not the advantages of education, I must
say that they are very likely to influence their practice in life. When
I hear, too, such doctrines ascribed to a desire to support the pure
faith of Christianity, I cannot help having a lurking suspicion that
they are rather intended to maintain a spiritual authority capable of
being applied to temporal purposes, which has been said to be extinct,
but which I contend, is still existing. In 1807 Pope Pius VII. sent to
the Catholic bishops of Ireland a bull, which granted an indulgence of
three hundred days to all those persons who should with devout purpose
repeat a certain ejaculatory address; and by the same instrument another
indulgence of one hundred days was granted, for the repeating of a
certain other formula, both of them applicable to souls in purgatory. It
is painful to think that such a mockery should be made of religion,
in order to press the authority of man; it is disgusting to find such
things sent by rational men to rational men, to be disseminated amongst
an illiterate and fanatical populace. The friends of emancipation may
ridicule, if they choose, the indications of a new reformation which now
show themselves in Ireland; but so long as free discussion is allowed,
and such m