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Pædo-baptist characteristic, and to permit the equality to be real. When I see the "Union" principle as warmly taken up by leading Independents as it is by leading Baptists, I will gladly acknowledge that my brethren are under no delusion in supposing that a true congregationalism can be established and maintained.*

Meanwhile, individual convictions would have to maintain their ground as best they might. It remains to be seen whether, as predicted last month, the next generation of those Baptists who are now in fellowship with Independent and other churches will have renounced their principles. It must be admitted that if the union be fair and true, such a result need not follow. I have no fear of truth being worsted in an open encounter, if such encounter can only be secured! Nor need Baptist organizations and societies necessarily suffer by the scattering of the forces which have been accustomed to support them. All here depends, we will not say on the ability and astuteness of the Baptists in making terms with Pædo-baptists, but upon the spirit of Christian charity on both sides.

It is a curious question how far the state of things to which, whether we like it or not, we are assuredly tending, will witness the development of new combinations of belief in reference to baptism. Why, for instance, should a Baptist be almost always a Congregationalist also? Why should there not be BaptistPresbyterians, even Baptist-Episcopalians? The rite and the church order have no essential connexion. Then again, why should everybody who believes in baptism as a personal act hold also the mode of immersion? Is it not very supposable that a man might reject infant baptism, and yet regard the mode as of no consequence, so as to be willing to sprinkle an adult on the profession of faith? I myself hold all threecongregationalism, adult baptism, immersion; but it would be strange if many were not found to hold one or two of these beliefs without the remainder. Pædobaptists" have frankly

said to me, "If you will give up the mode, we are ready to give up the subjects, of the ordinance;" and I have known Baptists who would be ready to accept the challenge. Certainly, the larger sacrifice would not be ours!

On the whole, I am convinced that the next few years will see great changes among us. The denomination itself will become concentrated, and therefore more certain and assured in its movements than it can be now. The so-called Baptist

* Since the above was written, the Patriot newspaper has distinctly declared that if the Baptists would set the example of a thoroughly equal comprehension, the Congregationalists would follow. Is this official?

churches, which are really not so, will cease to assume the name. Churches on the "Union," or Catholic Congregational principle, will at least be attempted on a larger scale than ever, and Baptists of the Bunyan school will for a while be found everywhere. Whether they will have disposition, power, and opportunity to maintain their views remains for time to prove. I wish I could be more hopeful on this point; for as the dispersion is inevitable, it would, if accompanied by an intelligent tenacity of conviction, accomplish a great work.

I am, Sir,

Your obedient servant,

A BAPTIST.

THE ENCYCLICAL AND THE ANTI-STATE-CHURCH PARTY IN FRANCE.

WHATEVER may be thought of the prudence of the Vatican in launching the Encyclical of the eighth of last December, the tenth anniversary of the promulgation of the dogma of the Immaculate Conception, there can be no doubt as to the courage of the Papal act. That it was meant as Rome's answer to the famous Convention of the 15th of September all the world believes, in spite of the plausible attempts of the French cardinals, during the recent debate in the Imperial Senate, to mystify the matter. They wished to make it appear that there was no connexion whatever been the two documents; but their illadvised endeavour to prove this only served to force from the Imperial Government those damaging disclosures which rendered the relationship between the Franco-Italian treaty and the Ecclesiastical manifesto clearer than ever. Their Eminences asserted that the Bull had been draughted by a French bishop several years ago, and, after being submitted to the Conclave, had been handed down amongst the prelates assembled at the great Convocation held at Rome, ostensibly for the purpose of the canonization of the Japanese martyrs. All this the Emperor's spokesmen had no difficulty in admitting; but they added significantly that their master, being well aware that such a missive was brewing, had, up to the eve of the conclusion of the Convention, prevailed on the Pope to forbear from the contemplated outrage on the public opinion of the civilized world. When at last the portentous step was resolved on, the Pope's protector was taken as much by surprise as the rest of mankind. Of course he would have been the simplest, instead of being one of the astutest of men, had he not seen it to be a blow aimed at himself by the Priest over whose head he was holding the sword

of Damocles. Surely it was a deed either of sublime daring or of no less sublime fatuity. He is brayed in the morter of affliction, and the Galileo of Obscurantism still bravely cries, “E por si muove."

He might have temporised, as even Spain now advises him to do, and as so many of his predecessors in the chair of Peter have done. To cite no more, there was the penult Pius for a model, who contrived to keep on some terms with the penult Napoleon, in times quite as difficult as the present. There is yet a third course just conceivable, one not less original than the path he has struck out for himself, and one which will have to be adopted some day, unless the Papacy is really to last for ever. He might have sent Antonelli to the right-about, dissolved the College of Cardinals, and then abdicated, thus saving himself, France, Italy, and the world, a great deal of unnecessary trouble. An enthusiastic friend of ours, in the interval between the telegraphic announcement of the forthcoming Bull and its publication in the newspapers, took the trouble to draught for him an Encyclical which would have answered all these desirable ends, and earned for him the thanks of all future generations. Under the circumstances, even purists would have overlooked its not altogether perfect Latinity. In case the reader should like to see it, we here print it, accompanied with a translation which, without professing to be literal, sufficiently expresses its spirit in pretty intelligible English :

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UNIGENITUS Cum Filius Dei, sedens super monte una, illa nempe Beatitudinum, dixit, Non potestis Deo servire et Mammonæ, rationale est ut ego, qui sedeo super septem montibus, donassero exemplum percutientem obedientiæ mei mandato illo pergravi. Igitur, non multiplicare verba, cum perdificile est, pro ratione moxissime donando, meipsum in Latino exprimere, dimissivi, dicens ei Apage! Satana! Cardinalem nuper meum Secretarium Statûs. Abiit, evasit, erupit Judas iste in locum suum ad quod destinavi eum, nempe ut Episcopus de Solferino in partibus infidelium.

Insuper, ut societati filii latronis non desit illud fautoris furum et perduellionarum pedis digitem applicavi ad sedem honoris regis nuper

TRANSLATION (Free and Easy).

To all and sundry to whom these presents may come, Parthians and Medes and Elamites, &c., &c.; in short, to all Christians, Mussulmans, Jews, and Pagans in Europe, Asia, Africa, America, and Australia, with the Isles of the Sea-I,Nebuchadnezar, having grazed too long amongst asses, dogs, foxes, wolves, bears, tigers, and other wild cattle, and having at last, through Celestial mercy, once more become a MAN, with some little glimmer of reason and some faint spark of human feeling, do hereby, in this my last will and testament, decree that a stop be everywhere put to the brutal oppression and Cainish strife now raging throughout the world, about things temporal and spiritual.

To this end, being minded to abdicate forthwith those pretentions to rule over men's bodies and souls,

Siciliorum duorum et absquatulavit Majestas sua ut fulgur de cælo.

Nunc itaque spirans admodum liberius, lacrymavi amerissime, egi pœnitentiam pro peccatis meis terribilibus, et cum oportet edere fructus idoneos poenitentiæ sinceræ mei, decerno hæc tria negotios.

I. Quoniam sancita sit auctoritatæ priscæ Romani pietatis, necnon Legalis Evangelicæque doctrinæ, patria potestas super liberos suos, reddo ad eorum parentes parvulos Judæos istos, Mortara et Cohen, et nunquam iterum kidnapuero hædos juvenes Paganos, Islamiticos, Judæos, aut Christianos, Sic Deus mihi adjuvabit.

II. Item, videns ut filius meus dilectus, Victor Emmanuel, Rex Italiæ, donavit nuperrime Christianissimum exemplum omnibus regibus, reginis, Presidentibus, et Potestatibus omnibus in generali, et cum non sit decens laicum superare sacerdotem in generositate, ex corde mea invito dictum Victorem Emmanuelem, Regem Italiæ, intrare Romam in bigo latus a latere cum Generali Garibaldio, non post duos annos, sed quod est multo melius, intra duos septimanas. Pro meipso rogo humilissime tugurium tantum cum hortulo. Alioquin abibo Hierichuntem. Spero ut Suus Apostolicus Majestas, Imperator Austriæ, sequaverit quam primissime meum exemplum, et reddibit Venetas Italiæ

suæ.

III. Ultime, habens compertam ut Primatus Petri est primatus intelligentiæ caritatisque, sciensque benissime quod ego nec sum lucidissimus comes super terram, nec adhuc egi partes clementissimi, patientissimi, aut amantissimi inter homines, illud Primatum Petrinicam, quod diutissime fuitus est murum lapidissimum et ollavitricissimum inter veros Christianos, abdico in æternum, humillimeque oro fratres nostros Transatlanticos Cainiticam suum bellum suum servitutemque non minus Cainiticam jamissime deponere, ut omnes simul utroque continenti osculamus

about which in the time of my beastly aberration I was tempted by my pride (which may Heaven and my brethren forgive) to make such a fuss, do hereby publish this my last will and testament, which all true priests, whether in cowls, rochets, soutanes, surplices, Gesquares gowns, hoods or broador rhomboids, and with or without neva brims, beards, coat-tails, or upper or nether integuments to be carried out by the force of public opinion.

I. I bequeath my temporal power to Victor Emmanuel, King of Italy, to whom, seated in his carriage side by side with Garibaldi, I shall this day fortnight be proud to hand the keys of the future capital of his kingdom.

II. Since my power over all kings and potentates of the earth has long since departed, Crown No. 2 is hereby bequeathed to Madame Tussaud. The "Ou Clo", belonging to this department are presented to Moses and Sons, as some poor compensation for the miseries which their countrymen and co-religionists have endured for so many ages in the Ghetto.

III. My primacy over the groundfloor, upper story, and right and left cellars, with ovens, &c., &c., of the universe may go to Jericho. The tiara and other properties belonging to this department to my son, Professor Pepper.

Finally, dear brethren, no longer claiming dominion over your faith, but speaking as man to men, I give my humble suffrage with the view to the extinction of the accursed sin of simony, in behalf of these following propositions :

I. A SELF-DENYING AUDIENCE.— Let no spiritual teacher, Christian or non-Christian, taste bit or sup for a lent of forty days, save what shall be freely given him by the brethren whom he professes to enlighten and edify. As for the rest let them, die, &c.

II. Charged with the execution of this decree are:-For the French Empire, the Siecle, the Monde, and

inter nos fraternaliter, et gaudeamus igitur jovialem Missam Christi et beautam novum annum.-AMEN.

all other journals of every shade of opinion; for England, the Times, the Tablet, &c., &c.; for Germany, the Kreutz-Zeitung, Allgemeine-Zeitung, &c., &c.; for Italy, the Armonia, Opinione, &c., &c. ; for other nations, peoples, languages, tongues, from the sonorous Spanish to the Hottentot click, the most spiritual leaders they can find, and those best fitted to attune all such languages, tongues, garbles, clatters and clicks into one Catholic hymn of universal brotherhood and praise to Almighty God.

The fact has shown that our friend's expectations from the Christianity of Christ's Vicar were a good deal too sanguine. Antonelli is still master of the situation, and has gone to such lengths as are said to have startled the chivalrous Merode himself. He knew his monde, however, and if this be what is meant by the reputation which he enjoys for sagacity, it has certainly not belied him. He was, doubtless, quite prepared for the condemnation of the Encyclical in the Moniteur, and for the Circular of the French Minister of Public Worship, prohibiting its publication by the bishops subject to his control. Whether he contemplated the immense explosion of popular indignation and derision with which the document has been received, not only in France and Italy in particular, but throughout the civilized world, is quite another matter. It is certain that what was looked for as the effect of this furious ringing of the tocsin of alarm from St. Peter's was a demonstration on the part of the Catholic millions in quite a different sense. With the ideal of the Middle Ages ever before its eyes, the Ecclesiastical spirit knows not how to reckon with the prosaic realities of the days of steam and cotton. But the very illusion which blinded the Pope's politicians to the fact that the Encyclical, so far from rendering the execution of the Convention impossible, as they hoped, could not fail to convince thinking men, even in their own church, of its necessity, helped them to take the right measure of those to whom the missive was more immediately addressed. With men who shared their illusion, the blow would not be a coup manqué, and they knew better than the world at large that this was the case with the entire French Episcopate. That Ultramontanism had been making rapid strides of late in the church of Fleury and Bossuet; that Gallicanism had gone out of fashion, and that the teachings of Lamennais had told immensely upon the French clergy, notwithstanding his having died, like Tertullian, out of the Romish communion, were facts

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