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for all our knowledge of Greek and Roman letters? The monks handled copies that they never wrote. But that gave those copies neither more nor less credit. I did not mean that one ought not to thumb the scriptures in reading them, when I spoke of them being soiled by the hands of a monk. I have then, so far as objection has been made, as I conconceive, sustained the sixth proposition. Will the president moderator please have the 5th proposition read? [The 5th prop. was here read.] PROP. V. Her notions of purgatory, indulgences, auricular confession, remission of sins, transubstantiation, supererogation, &c. essential elements ner system, are immoral in their tendency, and injurious to the well-being of society, religious and political.

Now, my friends, I want to strike a blow at the main root of the whole papal superstition: for that root is found in the proposition just now read. I have but little time to do it, and shall, therefore, march right up to the point at once.

cross.

The capital, distinguishing doctrine of Protestantism, next to the bible alone as the rule and measure of christian faith and manners, and the right and duty of all to read and examine it is, that the death of Jesus Christ was not simply that of a martyr: but that "be died for our sins, according to the scriptures." That the death or sacrifice of Christ is the great sin offering, and the only sin offering, is a cardinal doctrine of Protestantism; and that there is now no priest, nor victim, nor sacrifice, nor altar, nor sin offering on earth follows, as a matter of course. Jesus was "the Lamb of God"-" Himself the sin offering and the priest." He expiated our sins in his own body on the "His blood cleanses from all sin." Papal priests, penances, confessions, masses, remissions, purgatories, intercessions of saints, angels, and almost all their ceremonies, arise from the notion, the radical mistake that the sacrifice of Christ, as a sin offering, an atonement, a reconciliation, was some way deficient. Although we can trace supererogation, purgatory, penances, lustrations, the intercessions of angels and dead men, &c. to the philosophers and dreamers of the east their divine Platos, Pythagorases and Aristotles: still the immediate origin and cause of all these errors may be traced to ignorance of the bible doctrine of the priesthood of Christ, the antitype of that of Aaron and Melchisidec. It was Dryden, a Roman Catholic poet, if I mistake not, who said that the dos pou sto, which Archimedes sought in vain by which to raise the globe, was found by the popes of Rome in the doctrine of purgatory. That was the philosopher's stone-the lever which lifts the world-which has brought more gold to Rome, than the discovery of America itself.

My friends, the doctrine of purgatory with all its correlates is based

on two errors.

1st. That man can do more than his duty:

2d. That something may be added to the sacrifice of Christ to give it more value or efficacy.

Now, I affirm, that no created being, not a Gabriel, or Uriel, or Raphael, or the highest of the angelic hosts, can do an act of supererogation. No man can, by any thought, word, or action, make God his debtor. "Who," says Paul, "has first given to the Lord, and it shall be recompensed to him again? For, of him, and through him, and to him, are all things." Jesus told his disciples, that when they had done all that was commanded them, they had only done their duty, and were to him unprofitable servants. The greatest saint that.

ever lived is not more holy than he ought to be, on his own account. This single thought evaporates that sea of merit which has performed such wonders in Roman story.

No human being has any thing to give to God; and therefore none can merit from him any thing. If a man's salvation depended on his shedding a single tear, where could he find it? The heart that feels and the tear that flows, clear as chrystal down the cheek of the most devoted saint, are of God's creation. And, therefore, it is out of the question, to conceive how any work of merit, as respects God, is possible for angel or for man.

Were a saint to turn pilgrim and peregrinate on his naked knees the four quarters of the globe, were he to give his body to the flames, when God asks it, or duty requires it; he has deserved nothing from God, on the ground of merit. He has only employed the powers that God gave him, and used his faculties in a way consonant to the designs of him that gave them. And sooner will a man add new glories to the sun or create new luminaries in the heavens, than add one attribute of merit or of power to the sacrifice of Christ. "He finished transgression: made an end of sin offerings, brought in an everlasting justification;" and left nothing to be done to make his sacrifice more meritorious or efficient.

Works of supererogation, auricular confession, masses for sins, transubstantiation, purgatory, with all the appurtenances thereto belonging, are the veriest ghosts of paganism-the phantoms of infatuated reason, attempts against the dignity of God and the supremacy, as well as the true and proper divinity and dignity of his Son.

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This superstition, this man of sin, stands with his two feet upon the two greatest lies in human history. He places his right foot on the first and his left foot on the second. Need I say that the former affirms that the sacrifice of God's own SoN is insufficient as a sin offering and that the latter teaches that man can do more than his duty to God. Here then, I say to my opponent, I will measure swords with him. Let him meet me on these too points, then it will be an easy task to dispose of his imaginary purgatories, transubstantiation, penances, works of supererogation, &c. &c. and to shew that so far from bringing glory to God or righteousness to men, they are positively, naturally, and necessarily opposed to both. Let him try his strength of scriptural argument and reason on these cardinal points, and it will, as our time is so far exhausted, save the tediousness of numerous details. [Time expired.]

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My friends, it is imperative upon me to make one exposition before I proceed. Many of you were here when my friend would have led you into a gross mistake, respecting the Catholic church, by quoting a pretended extract from Liguori. I asserted then, that nothing could be found in that writer's works to substantiate the odious charge, to give it so much as a semblance of truth. I have now before me the entire works of Liguori, and I have placed them in the presence of my friend, Mr. Campbell. The 9th volume has an index, containing every word of any importance, and I repeat, that after a search through the whole nine volumes, nothing like the quotation of last evening can be found. I have now placed the book in the hands of Professor

Biggs, of Lane seminary, one of the moderators, and a Protestant of the Presbyterian denomination, if I do not mistake, and I will leave it to him, or any other intelligent and candid man, to say to you whether the fact is as my friend has stated, or the very contrary of what he has stated.

MR. CAMPBELL. Be so good as to explain the matter fully. BISHOP PURCELL. I will explain the exact state of the case. Mr. Smith, the author of the translation, from whom my friend read this, as well as many other things, has given a false quotation, and made Liguori say, what he never said. The facts are these: a canon of the council of Trent, and Liguori, according to the canon, say, "that if a priest falls by criminal intercourse, as specified, from the holy state of purity, to which he is bound by a voluntary, deliberate, and solemn vow, he shall be deprived of a large portion of his salary for the first offence. If he does not refrain after admonition and such punishment, he is again admonished, and deprived of his whole salary, and suspended from all his functions as a priest in the Catholic church. But after the third admonition, if he is still incorrigible, he is excommunicated, and cut off from the church, even as St. Paul cut off the incestuous man of Corinth." 1st. Ep. Corinth. ch. 5. v. 5. No where, in any part of these volumes, is it said that a priest may sin thus upor paying a fine, &c.

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Thus, my friends, you see how the poisonous fountains of error and prejudice have been swelling over the land, and infecting the public mind, until many an honest and upright man has thought, when he denounced us for our (imputed) doctrines, he was doing God a service. Were he aware of the imposition practised on his credulity, he would, I have no doubt, have turned his indignation on more deserving victims. "If we leave off slandering them," said the ministers of Amsterdam, to Vossius, who remonstrated with them on their injustice to the Catholics, "our people will soon leave us." "We shall do no good with the people," said Shaftesbury, speaking of the Mocedo plot, if we cannot make them swallow greater nonsense than this." "Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbor," is a commandment which Maria Monk and her reverend protectors reckon not to belong to the "weightier things of the law." Their stale calumnies are paid for with the bloodmoney! Our doctrine, many of its ministerial adversaries know to be pure and holy; but, overwhelmed with confusion, whenever they attempt argument, they have no resource but in addressing themselves to the prejudices of their implicit believers. These mock at Catholics for "hearing the church;" and whom do they hear?

As to the bible, the whole difficulty is to be gone over again and again. Every new translation, it seems, lies open to objections on grave and important grounds. I have here a paper, printed at Kanawha, in Cabell county, Virginia. In it a considerable class of Baptists, I think they are, quarrel with their brethren near Zoar, in Ohio, and quarrel with the bible. They insist that all the existing translations of it should be rejected, and a new one commenced for themselves from the original Hebrew and Greek scriptures-if they get them! They can never get a bible they are sure of. They cannot get the original Hebrew in which the gospel of St. Matthew was written. St. Jerome says he had seen it, and that is all we know of it since. They cannot in twelve months of the time that the getting up of their bible will require, determine, on grounds satisfactory to a biblical

critic, and on Protestant principles, why they adopt or reject, as the event may be, the seventh verse, of the fifth chapter, of the 1st Epistle of St. John.

While this paper was being printed at Charleston, Virginia, the "Churchman," at New York, perhaps at the same hour, was printing the very proof I have read to you, in favor of the Catholic doctrine of confession. Let the Burmese and all others, Pagans or Christians, lie on their oars, till the new scriptures appear. Then let printers, agents and missionaries, be well paid, and the cumbrous machinery set to work, and compass heaven and earth to make one proselyte, who surely cannot be more settled in his faith than they who thus despise the "inspired, authoritative, perpetual, catholic, perfect and intelligible rule."

He says the documents I have read are not pertinent. Now he certainly did not suspect that I thought he would so consider them. In his estimation, there is nothing pertinent, logical, relevant, in all this discussion, but what he says himself. This he has neglected no opportunity of impressing on our attention. But the public will be the best judge, and they can see through the attempts of either disputant to forestall their impartial and unbiassed verdict. The printed report of this controversy, will shew the pertinency or impertinency of our respective arguments, and, for my own part, I have not the slightest fear of the result.

I am very far from believing that I am worthy of advocating the holy cause, in which my humble talents, and all my heart's affections are enlisted, but such is my confidence in the power of that truth, which I embraced on conviction as soon as I was able to judge for myself, and whose evidences have been, ever since, brightening to my understanding, the more I examine them, that I ask no more than that my unadorned arguments should fall into the hands of thinking men. My opponent says that the whole structure of Catholicism is an assumption, and rests upon two lies. The gentleman pledged himself at the commencement of this debate, to use no opprobrious language, and I promised not to set him the example. How he has kept his word, as the terms in which his propositions are expressed are so very refined, let these, by which they are defended, decide. I will not bandy epithets with him, but I must say that the Catholic church has two sound legs to stand upon. The gentleman tenders her crutches which she modestly declines, with the suggestion that as his argument is lame he may have occasion for them himself! I will argue these various doctrines which he has enumerated and prove them all to be founded in the bible, and believed, in all past ages, from the time of Christ and his apostles. The gentleman has misrepresented, or he does not understand our doctrine. We believe that there is no other name under heaven, but the name of Jesus given to men, whereby they may be saved. Acts iv. 12. We believe that "by one oblation Christ hath perfected for ever them that are sanctified," Heb. x. 14. That atonement by His vicarious sacrifice, if not the first, is one of the great cardinal doctrines of the Roman Catholic church, no man who pretends to any acquaintance with that doctrine, will, or can venture to deny. Christ has paid an all-sufficient price for our ransom. But do we arraign the sacrifice of Christ of insufficiency, when we sanctify the Sabbath, when we give alms to the poor, when we abstain from

evil, when we hear preaching, or go to prayer? When St. Paul chastised his body and brought it under subjection, lest, while he preached to others he should himself become a reprobate, did he believe Christ's sacrifice incomplete? that it needed his supplementary austerities? Or that the other Apostles should command us, to make sure our election and vocation by good works; to work out our salvation with fear and trembling? No; God who made us without ourselves, will not save us without ourselves. He requires our co-operation, and with his grace he aids our weak endeavor. This grace he communicates to us by divers channels, and in various ways. Of these the principal are the seven sacraments, which, if I may use the gentleman's figure in its proper appli cation, like the seven mouths of the Nile convey the healing waters from the fountains of the Savior to every portion of the church. The will is made and recorded. The executors, the apostles and priests of the church, convey and apply an adequate portion to the wants of men. Wherever a captive may be presumed to groan in spiritual slavery, they seek him out, they proclaim to him the glad tidings of his deliverance, they pay, with the treasures of Christ, of which they are the depositaries, the price of his ransom; and this when they find the slave willing to accept the terms on which redemption is offered, do they carry into effect, in his behalf, the charitable intentions of the divine testator. Is this arraigning his bounty, or distributing it as he commanded? Is this robbing Christ of his glory, or calling all nations to bask in its rays and exult in its effulgence? The Catholic church, in all the institutions she venerates, the sacraments she administers, the truths she proclaims, the sacrifices she offers, the prayers she prefers, the charity she inculcates, the grace she dispenses, acts by the command of Christ, in the name of Christ. This is the true and living way by which she commands all to seek access to the Father, and by Him, with Him, and in Him, to give to God all honor and glory forever. He is the sun of the entire system, and all the ordinances of religion, are but the rays of that sun enlightening and vivifying the christian pilgrim at every step of his weary progress through this vale of tears.

Sacrifice, we consider indispensable to religion. It has been offered to God in every age, by every people, under every form of religion. Abel offered sacrifice in Eden, the purest firstlings of his flocks, for he was a shepherd. Cain sacrificed the fruits of the earth, for he was a husbandman. Noah, when the waters of the deluge had subsided, Solomon, when he dedicated the temple, offered sacrifices; even the Pagan nations of the earth, who changed the glory of the incorruptible God, into the likeness of the image of corruptible man, and of birds, and of four-footed beasts, paid homage to this dictate of nature, and continued the rite of sacrifice, however unworthy the objects of idolatry. From all this we rightly infer, that the only perfect religion should not be destitute of sacrifice. The scripture everywhere testifies to its necessity. Melchisedec, as we read in Genesis, offered bread and wine. He was a priest of the most High God. And David, in the 109th Psalm, says of Jesus Christ, King of Justice, King of Peace, "The Lord hath sworn, and it shall not repent him, thou art a priest forever according to the order of Melchisedec." When God abrogates the Jewish dispensation, and substitutes a new and better in its stead, he says to the Jews, by the last of all the prophets, "I have no pleasure in you, saith the Lord of hosts; and I will not receive a gift

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