REFORMATION.
From the effects of that blow the Ro man Catholic interests have never yet re. covered. It was a deep and deadly wound to the usurpations of tyranny, and the towering pride of ecclesiastical domi nation. Iu the article to which we have already alluded, the reader will find a brief enumeration of the countries which received the doctrines of the reformation., as well also of those countries where the principles of religious liberty had made but little progress. These latter were principally France, Spain, Italy, and Po land. In each of these countries the spi rit of reform has, more or less, manifested itself since the era of the reformation. In the first of these countries particularly, the authority of the supreme head of the church has, since the commencement of the revolution, received an alarming di minution. Indeed, the liberties of the Gallican church had always depended up on two maxims : 1. That the Pope has not authority to command any thing in general or particular, in which the civil rights of the kingdom are concerned. 2. That though the Pope's supremacy is owned in spiritual matters ; yet his power is limited and regulated by the decrees and canons of ancient councils in the realm. These maxims in the Gallican church have been superseded by the Con cordat; and still mare by events of a very recent date. When the French revolution first broke out, the clergy in that country suffered every species of insult and cruel ty that an infuriate rabble or more refin ed councils could invent. Their tythes and revenues were taken from them, and the possessions of the church were coa sidered as national property. The reli gious orders were dissolved, and their es tates confiscated. When the National Assembly attempted to impose upon the clergy what they denominated the civil constitution of the clergy, a refusal to submit to it, and to that of taking an oath to maintain it, was attended with the most alarming consequences. One hundred and thirty-eight bishops and archbishops, and sixty-eight curates, or vicars, were on this account driven from their sees and parishes. Numbers of these unfor tunate men were massacred in the streets, while hundreds of them sought refuge in this and other countries. Notwithstand ing these proceedings, on the 28th of la lay, 1795, a decree was obtained for the freedom of religious worship; and on the following June the churches in Paris were re-opened, and divine service was again performed with great ceremony. The clergy have never since been molested in France ; but their power and influence were greatly diminished : for though the Moderefs, or Brissotine party, recalled them, no establishment was made for them, until Bonaparte, as First Consul, procured the Pope's consent to the Con cordat, which the old Catholics assert surrendered all their rights and privileges of the church to the secular head.
By degrees the Pope of Rome has con tinued to lose his influence in France. The number of Catholic clergy is now ve ry considerably reduced ; and all the re ligious orders in France, the Sisters of Charity excepted, are abolished, together with all public processions, pilgrimages, &c. The French General, Bonaparte, drove the late Pope, Pius VI. from Rome, and compelled him to take shelter in a Carthusian about two miles from Florence, where he died, August 19th, 1799. The French army who took possession of Rome, made no ceremony in abolishing many of those rites which the centuries had been regarded as sa cred. A new Pope, however, has been elected, who has taken the name of Pius VII. This pontiff at present resides at Rome, the seat of his ancestors, and has often officiated in the Vatican. But his power is gone, probably for ever. Bora parte has lately seized on his temporal do minions, and driven his friends and coun sellors, the Cardinals, from his presence.
On the 19th of April, 1808, a most curi ous and interesting state paper was pub lished by the Pope, entitled "Answer of his Eminence Cardinal Crabrielli, first Se cretary of State, to the Note of his Excel lency M. Champagny, addressed to M. Le Fevre, Charge d'Affaires from the Emperor of France." We lament that our limits will not permit us to preserve the whole of this curious document in our pages. We may, however, remark, that this paper is in answer to a demand which the French ruler had made upon his Holiness, to enter into an offensive and defensive league with the other powers of Italy, against all the enemies of France, and also that the Pope should dismiss from his court the Cardinals. To these demands his Holiness replies in a spirited but highly pathetic strain. Ile declares in one part of his paper, that " His Holi ness, unlike other princes, is invested with a two-fold character, namely, of So vereign Pontiff; and of Temporal Sove. reign, and has given repeated evidence that he cannot, by virtue of this second qualification, enter upon engagements, which would lead to results militating against his first and most important office, and injuring the religion of which he iS the head, the propagator, and the aven ger." The French Emperor had declared, that in case the Pope would not accede to his demands, he would seize upon the temporal dominions of the Holy See. To which his Holiness replies, That " If, in spite of all this, his Majesty shall take possession, as he has threatened, of the papal dominions, respected by all, even the most powerful monarchy, during a space of ten centuries and upwards, and shall overturn the government, his Holi ness will be unable to prevent this spolia tion ; and can only, in bitter affliction of heart, lament the evil which his Majesty will commit in the sight of God, trusting in whose protection, his Holiness will re main in perfect tranquillity, enjoying the consciousness of not having brought on this disaster by imprudence or by contt macy, but to preserve the independence of that sovereignty, which he ought to transmit uninjured to his successors, as he received it ; and to maintain in its inte grity, that conduct which may secure the universal concurrence of all princes, so necessary to the welfare of religion," What the final result of these negocia tions will be time only can determine ; this, however, is certain, at present, that the Roman Pontiff has lost his power and authority in France. Nor are his pros pec:s much more firvourable in other countries. There is scarcely a Catholic State in Europe that does not every year relax in its observance of the Romish laws, and in obedience to the Holy See. The terrors of the Inquisition no longer exist ; the thunders of the Vatican are ceased or disregarded ; some of the most maNims of popery are not only destroyed by the liberal spirit of the times, hut even publicly disavowed by' nu merous and respectable bodies of Catho lics: in short, little now remains of the Runtish h and practice, especially' in our own that ought to give seri ous offence to liberal Protestants of the Church of England ; there is indeed no thing remaining among these people of a nature dangerous to the peace and hap piness of the at large.
The question concerning the Catholic Emancipation in England and in Ireland being as yet undecided, we must omit any further notice out ; at the same time most ardently longing that the period may soon commence, when no difference of opinion whatever, no variation in our wor ship, shall prove a barrier to the full ex ercise of all those rights, both civil and religions, to which all men are born, and to which all good and peaceable men have an equal claim. See PAP] STS.