complete disclaimer to the Pope's right to temporal power, or of his right to the allegiance of subjects, or to any portion of it, be imagined? Now, up to the moment of the French revolution, every prelate of France signed this declaration,—yet the Pope instituted every such prelate to his see; every secular, every regular priest signed it,—yet the Pope admitted every such secular, every such regular priest into his communion. Nay, more ;*-in the negotiations in 1811, between Pope Pius VII. and Napoleon, the latter vehemently insisted on the Pope's sanctioning the Gallican declaration of 1682; the Pope refused to sign the three last articles; but the first-that which confines the power of the Pope to spiritual concerns-that which proclaims the civil independence of sovereigns—that which propounds the absolute and irreversible right of sovereigns to the allegiance of their subjects, and denies it to the Pope this article, this very article, the Pope assented to without any hesitation. He declared, that "if the dispute turned on that article only, he would "subscribe it without difficulty." What, then, becomes of the charge of divided allegiance? We reject it; the Pope disclaims it; the whole Catholic world laughs at it; then let us hear no more of it.

4. Permit me now to avow a suspicion, that if those who make this charge would consult their own minds, they would find that they themselves scarcely believe it. There are persons who profess to discern some threatening clouds in the north of the political horizon, and to think that they advance angrily, steadily, and not very slowly, towards England. Supposing the prognostics

* Official Letters of the Archbishop of Tours, inserted by him in his publication, entitled, " Fragmens relatif a l'Histoire Ecclesiastique des " premieres Années du xix Siecle."

of these gentlemen to be realized-that all these clouds should lour over our coasts, and that the Pope (a most ridiculous supposition) should appear in the midst of them, and direct the storm! would any one gravely say, that, in the impending conflict, the Catholics should be distrusted? If the Lord Chancellor should be then asked, whether the allegiance of the Catholic peers, beyond the bar of the House, should be relied on as much as the allegiance of the Protestant peers within it, would he doubt?-would he not immediately answer in the affirmative ?-If the Speaker of the House of Commons were asked, whether the allegiance of the Catholics in those ranks from which members of the House are usually chosen, should, on such an occasion, be as much depended on as the allegiance of the actual members of his House,-would not he, too, answer in the affirmative? If similar questions were proposed to the grand juries, or to the magistrates of the quarter sessions, would they not return the same affirmative answer? What, then, becomes of the charge?

5. I call upon my countrymen to think of the conduct of the Catholics when the Spanish Armada threatened our coast. Every cruelty, every indignity which the most atrocious policy could invent, the Catholics had suffered from queen Elizabeth and her ministers. The Catholics knew that Pope Pius V. had excommunicated the queen-had deposed her had absolved them from their allegiance to her, and implicated them in her excommunication, if they continued true to her; that Pope Sixtus, the reigning Pope, had renewed the excommunication-had called on every Catholic prince to execute the sentence; and that Philip II. by far the most powerful monarch of the time, had undertaken ithad lined the shores of the Continent with troops ready, at a moment's notice, for the invasion of England, and

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had covered the sea with an armament which was proclaimed to be invincible. In this awful moment, when England stood in need of all her strength, and the slightest diversion of any part of it might have proved fatal to her, the worth of a Catholic's loyalty was fully shown. “Some," says Hume, “equipped ships at "their own charge, and gave the command of them to "Protestants; others were active in animating their "tenants, their vassals, and their neighbours, in de“ fence of their country.” "Some," says the writer of an intercepted letter, printed in the second volume of the Harleian Miscellany, " by their letters to the council, signed by their own hand, offered that they would "make adventures of their own lives in defence of the queen, whom they named their undoubted sovereign, lady and queen, against all foreign foes, though they "were sent from the Pope, or at his commandment; yea, some did offer that they would present their "bodies in the foremost ranks." Lord Montague, a zealous Catholic, and the only temporal peer who ventured to oppose the act for the queen's supremacy, in the first year of her reign, brought a band of horsemen to Tilbury, commanded by himself, his son, and his grandson, thus perilling his whole house in the expected conflict. The annals of the world do not present a more glorious or a more affecting spectacle than the zeal, the undivided allegiance, shown on this memorable occasion by the poor and persecuted, but loyal, but honourable Catholics! Nor should it be forgotten that, in this account of their loyalty, all historians are agreed. Then, is it not shameful to charge the Catholic descendants of these admirable Catholics with divided allegiance?—thus to spurt disloyalty in their faces?

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6. It is remarkable that the kingdom abounds in double allegiance, and no notice is taken of it. At this present

time, the presumptive heir of the Crown owes, as Duke of York, allegiance to King George IV. of England, and also owes, as bishop of Osnaburgh, allegiance to King George II. of Hanover.

Has there ever been a Catholic mean enough to talk of this double allegiance of his Royal Highness? Such meanness never entered into our minds.

No! THE CATHOLIC RELIGION IS THE RELIGION OF GENTLEMEN, AND OF THOSE WHO THINK LIKE GENTLEMEN. ALL THEY ASK IS, THAT THEIR ADVERSARIES SHOULD THINK AND ACT AS GENTLEMEN IN THEIR REGARD.- -The duke of Richmond is duke d'Aubigni, and possesses fiefs in France. The duke of Marlborough is a prince of Germany, and possesses a German principality. The duke of Wellington is a grandee of the first class in Spain, and holds large territorial possessions in Valentia. All these illustrious persons owe allegiance to the sovereigns within whose territories their possessions are situate; all, too, owe allegiance to his Britannic Majesty. This double allegiance has not been, and ought not to be, reproached to them. But while the questionably double allegiances of all these distinguished personages has ever been passed over in silence, and perhaps never thought of, double allegiance has been invented for Catholics; and they have been criminated for it, and for all its possible or rather ideal consequences. Is this fair? Is it just? Is it honourable? No! Let us, then, hear no more of this charge. How can it enter into the mind of an honourable man to make it?

7. The belief of Alexander the Great in virtue, when he received the cup from his physician, who was accused of a wish to poison him, has been deservedly praised. Will Protestants, in respect to their Catholic brethren,

never aspire to the same belief in virtue? Will they always remain blind to the loyalty of the Catholics ?– to their immense services in their fleets and armies ?Will they never recollect, that if their ungenerous accusations should drive the Catholics from these, frightful indeed would be their solitude? Will the Protestants always forget, that, when all her Protestant colonies rebelled against England, Catholic Canada alone was true to her allegiance? Will they-but the subject is endless. If there be one thing more certain than another, it is that which we now confidently assert: THAT THE LOYALTY OF THE CATHOLICS OF THE UNITED EMPIRE IS PURE, PERFECT AND UNDIVIDED; THAT IT WILL BEAR ANY TRIAL; THAT, IN EVERY TRIAL, IT WILL BE FOUND EMINENTLY PURE; AND THAT IT IS MOST UNGENEROUS AND MOST UNWISE TO DISTRUST IT.

CHARLES Butler.

N° IV.

Letter on the Coronation Oath, first inserted in the Old Times.

FEW Parliamentary documents possess, in any point of view, so much importance as the speech delivered on the 25th of last month, in the House of Lords, by his Royal Highness the Duke of York, on presenting the petition of the Dean and Canons of Windsor against granting any further relief to his Majesty's Roman Catholic subjects.

Lamenting, as they must do, that his Royal Highness is so adverse to their petitions, still the Roman Catholics are grateful for his open avowal of his opinions, and of the reasons upon which they are grounded. It allows