The Sun.
London, England, 1864-08-31 00:00:00

Roman Catholicism and Protestantism.

On Sunday afternoon Dr. Goss, the Roman Catholic
bishop of the diocese of Liverpool, laid the foundation stone
of a new Roman Catholic chapel at Easton, a village a few
miles from Preston. The chapel will cost about £3,000, and
will accommodate upwards of 400 people. Mr Pugin, of
London, is the architect of the building.
After the ceremony the bishop addressed the concourse of
people present, about 2,000. In the course of his speech he
said—Do not let any one suppose that this is a vain cere-
mony which we have been performing. Na doubt there are
some who will tell you that they saw the ceremony, saw the
procession, saw the priests walking round the building, saw
them headed by a cross, and even saw the bishop himself
bow down and worship it. Worship it I Why, my brethren,
we no more worship that cross than we worship the pillars
and the scaffolding which have been raised for the erection
of this building—but wo honour it, love it, and bow down '
to it because it contains the sacred image of Him who died
for the redemption of man. Who is there who does not love
and honour the image of a good friend, a brother,or a sister ?
In these days, after photography has multiplied portraits of
almost every created thing, there is hardly a man so poor
who does not wish to have the image either of his children
or his wife—not a woman hardly who does not wish for the
portrait of her husband or her children, of her mother, or of
some loved ene—and look upon them in their hours of trial,
in their times of trouble, and call to mind the lessons which
in life they gave them,and derive some comfort, some hope,
some pleasure from the contemplation of them. There is
many a man who has been cheered and made happy for the
time by looking upon the portrait of his mother—of that
mother whose body is decaying in the ground, whilst her
eyes seem to look upon him as in the happier days of the
past. So we feel a reverence and a love for the cross—for
that image of Jesus Christ to whom we feel that we owe
everything we possess. He has redeemed us, saved us, and
broken open the gates of heaven, and given us a title to the
regions of the blessed. Therefore vain aro the slanders used
against us as to falling down and worshipping images. And
there are those who will tell you that this ceremony is a
piece of Popish mummery, that it is a foreign superstition,
and that we are Italian in our notions and feelings; that we
are not genuine Englishmen; that we are perverts to our
country ; that our allegiance is divided ; that we do not obey
the Queen as our legitimate sovereign; that we place the
Pope of Rome above all the powers of this country ; and that
our allegiance to our sovereign is spurious, and our loyalty
without foundation. If those who bring such charges as
these against us had studied the history of this country—if
they had examined the events of the past—they would find
that for 300 years we have stood faithfully to the throne of
the country, even at the expense cf out lives, and that we
have risked our fortunes in defence of the Crown. Why
was it that we stood by the Stuarts ? Was it because they
were Cathnlicly inclined? Yet we have never been so de-
serted as by the Stuarts. It was through them and whilst
standing up in defence of the country that we lost much of
our properity, that many of our priests lost their lives, that
they were hunted like wild beasts, that they had to fly from
their houses and their homes. We were aliens in our own
country. 'We were hunted down as traitors and robbers.
And why ? Because a change had come over the country ;
no longer was the old religion allowed ; and although Eliza-
beth bore a hard hand upon us—long she had been cruel—
we
did not suffer as much from her persecution as from that
in the time of the Stuarts, How did the Catholics conduct
themselves when Cromwell with his iron warriors arose to
crush the injuries which were then supposed to exist? The
Catholics, up to a man, were found faithful to the side of the
Stuarts. And why ? Because it is the very principle of their
religion—they cannot, and they dare not be otherwise—they
must be loyal, as they must be honest and just, and observe
all the other Christian virtues. For we believe that loyalty
is a duty that we owe to the Crown, just as much as we hold
it necessary that we should observe the virtues of justice, of
chastity, of temperance, and of prudence. Therefore, I
say, away with accusations brought against Catholics that
they are not loyal. We are not Italians, but Englishmen.
And let me tell you that our ritual and doctrines are not
new—we are not the followers of a new ritual, of new ser-
vices; our ceremonies and principles are not the product of
modern imagination and recent enactments ; but they come
down to us from antiquity, and there is no Catholic church
in the land whose doctrines and ritual are not of pre-refor-
mation origin, and whose operations have not been blessed
with the same creed as that which used to exist among our
ancestors. If your ancestors wore to rise up from the dead
and saw any of you bowing to a different creed they would
ignore you—if they saw any of you worshipping according
to the present Catholic creed they would at once recognise
your fellowship and fall down before the same altar and bow
to the same saintly names as yourselves. I know it is gene-
rally said that the grandness, the greatness of England has
been dependent upon the change of religion which has taken
place in the land. But why has not the same thing made
Holland great? There was a time when she threatened
even our land—when a Dutch admiral sailed up the Chan-
nel with a broom at his masthead, intimating thereby that
he had swept the English out of the seas. Yet Holland has
fallen—fallen from a great country to something less than
a second-rate Power, and yet Holland has always remained
'true to her principles of religion. And there was a time
when the Gustavus Adolphus of Sweden came down upon
the peoples of the western nations, and crashed many in
the very midst of his might. Yet where is Sweden now ?
Sho has almost passed away from the na ions ; she has
stood by and seen that poor little kingdom of Denmark
actually devoured and worried by the great Powers of Ger-
many, and has not dared to lend a helping hand. And yet
Sweden has remained always constant, always firm to
the principles of the Reformation—to the religion which
England has changed for that of her forefathers. If
the changed religion if religion at all, as advo-
cated by many in these times made a nation
great, if it has made England great, the countries I have
named would surely have been great indeed. Has religion
anything to do with it? No, my brethren ; it is not on ac-
count of religion, but on account of the discoveries of coal,
and iron, and cotton, which have made this country great.
Is it the religion of the Reformation that has made us great
and prosperous? Is it not rather through our discoveries
and experiments, and trade in coal, and cotton, and iron,
which have made this country known to the utmost bounds
of the earth? No, believe me, religion has nothing to do
with the depression of one country or the elevation of
another. The religion we profess is not, I need hardly say,
now, or strange, or foreign, It is the religion which the
country professed, which our ancestors loved, from the
days when the great Gregory, the Pope, sent forth mis-
sionaries to convert our Saxon forefathers. There was a
time when our poor ancestors roamed over the fields and in
the woods, more like savages than men. then the Roman
legions came and invaded the country; they reduced our
ancestors, or rather raised them, to a point of civilisation.
Then the Raman empire gave way, and savage persons
from Denmark and Saxony came down upon the country
and conquered its inhabitants, and reduced it again to a
titato of servitude. Some of the inhabitants were sold as
slaves, and carried to Rome, There they attracted the atten-
tion of the great Gregory. He saw them, inquired from
,ghat nation they cams; ho looked upon their fair faces,
and saw their long, flowing, comely locks ; ho was told that
they' were Angles; and when he heard this he said, " Xon
fingt;s: sal angeliforent, si esscnt Christiant"—They would
not be Angles, but angels, had they been Christians,"
Gregory sent missionaries to England from Rome, and
they remained amongst our forefathers until the lust of
Henry VIII. burst through the bonds of the law, and be-
cause the Popo would not allow him to be divorced from
his wife, he separated himself from the Church of Rome.
But he only separated from her jurisdiction. He believed
in the same doctrines, and he sent men to the scaffold
because they dared to profess what were called the prin-
ciplee of tin Beionuatip, But Henry mood ftw 071 and

others came, and they took advantage of the youth 0?
Edward VI. ; they introduced a new form of worship; and
nobles seiz HI the mona-teries, and their descendants remain
in possession of them auto this day. Why is it that Lord
Russell is so embittered a.pinet Catholics? It is because
his ancestors lived on the spoils of the Catholic Church—
because he retains their possessions—and, as a man gene-
rally hates that which he has injured, so Lord Russell hates
us because his ancestors grew great on our sacrifices. But
do we want what our opponents have—do you want to take
back that which they have got? Not a bit of it. 7e care
not for the lands and churches they have taken. As long
as we have a generous people to depend upon, we rely upon
them to build up our churches and altars for the worship of
God. We rely not alone upon Catholics, but upon others
as wall. Our opponents may have their churches and enjoy
their livings. But if it had not been for us they would have
had to depend upon voluntary charity. I contend, when we
consider the history of their church and ours, tbat we have
a right, a title, a claim to some return from their hands.
We therefore say unto them " You possess the places we
raised to worship God in ; you possess those immense livings
and tithes which were anciently given up by the Catholics ;
ycu have got them all, you have separated us from them,
and we now ask something back from you in return. It is
true you no longer persecute us, but we claim something;
we ask not for your churches, but we request your aid.
And, believe me, the people of this country never did per-
secute us. If it had not been for the people of this country
we could not have existed, and therefore when the law was
violated against Catholics they always found protection
amongst their neighbours, and many Catholic gentlemen,
who now enjoy their broad acres of land in this country
are indebted tor them to their Protestant neighbours. In
times of trouble they handed their property over to their
neighbours ; in times of peace those neighbours returned
it. If it had not been for the people we should have been
clushed out of the land. I therefore appeal this day with
confidence to all—no matter what their creed may bet-,-for
help and assistance. We are engaged i a great work. We
are trying to raise up a temple to God. We profess a faith
not new. It is a faith which was ancie tly professed in this
country, professed by a thousand ye
.s and more by our
ancestors ; and when the great judgment day comes and all
your kith and kin rise from thegrave, and when their bones
are clothed with flesh and blood, you will find that far more
are marked with the sign of the Cross than with the sign
marks of the Reformation. For a thousand years your an-
cestors lived and died in the Catholic faith, and should any
of your children become Catholics they will side with them.
Should they profess another faith they will be opposed to
them. We are not, I contend, the worshippers of a new
faith, but of an ancient religion, and when you are standing
up for it you are vindicating those out of whose loins you
have come. Your forefathers worshipped at the same shrine,
and as there is no duty more excellent than that of a man
honouring his father and mother, and treasuring up the
lessons of wisdom which have come down from them, so
can there be no holier exercise than that of engaging in the
• same worship as that they professed. Let no one say that
we are traitors or foreigners ; if any one does say so believe
it not. We have been born on the soil, and have all the
feelings of Englishmen. And we are proud of the govern-
ment under which we now live. We believe it to be the
best, the most perfect form of government in the world. It
is a constitutional government. On one side, it avoids the
absolutism of the Crown ; on the other, it prevents the level-
ling powers of a democracy and a republic. Think you that
the imperialism of Russia is more tyrannical, or that it
crushes more people than Abraham Lincoln, who is the
representative of a Liberal Government in the Republic
across the ocean ? .No ; there is no tyranny more terrible
than that which heirs the banner of liberty—that banner
which crushes the' liberty of others whilst it raises up
itself, which brings itself into fame because it has trodden
down almost everything else that may be near it. No ;
believe me, the
,Patholics in this country are the same as
other men. Wad belong to the nation ; we are English in
heart and loyalist purpose ; we wish for its progress and
hope for its prosperity; and, in religion, are faithful to the
doctrine of our ancestors and the ritual of ages, which has
the blessing oaf God upon it, and which no human power
can uproot. 1 .
The bishop then made an appeal for funds on behalf of ,
the new church, and shortly afterwards concluded.—Liver-
pool Daily Pest. •

Whe Great English Railways.
THE MIDLAND.

We hive now disposed of the two giants of the British
railway ivorld,and we are approaching undertakings of lesser
but stilVrespectable magnitude. The Midland, which comes
under notice in succession to the London and North West-
Ivrn and Great Western, is a powerful and
,prosperousa, en-
terprise, which is intimately bound up and associated with
British life and commerce, since we find it at Glocester in
the west, Sheffield in the north-east, and Peterborough in
the east; while, not content with remaining in the pro-
vinces the directors have now boldly ventured upon a direct
independent lino from Bedford to London. The task of re-
viewing the progress of the Midland in 1861-62-63 is a com-
paratively easy one, as the system has become thoroughly
consolidated, while simplicity characterises its manage-
ment and its relations with minor concerns which have
associated themselves with their prosperous neighbour.
Thus, when we speak of the Midland we have only to
mention also as part and parcel of it, in respect to working
arrangements, &c., the North-Western--styled in the rail-
way world with a certain sober facetiousness the "Little
North-Western" in contradistinction to the mighty London
and North-Western--the Redditch, the Ashley Canal, and
the Manchester, Buxton, Matlock, and Midland Junction.
The extent of way worked has made some but not very
rapid progress during the last three years. Thus the sys-
tem comprised—December 31, 1851, 633 miles (533 miles
double and 50 miles single) ; December 31, 1862, 647 miles
(597 miles double and 50 miles single) ; and December 31,
1863, 658 miles (603 miles double and 50 miles single).
The system thus expanded in 1852 and 1863 to the extent
of 25 miles. The traffic acquired, the working expenses in-
curred, and the pi ofits realised upon this mileage in 1861,
1862, and 1863 were as follows :-
1861 £2,214,456 £922,386 £1,292,070
1862 2,228,656 971,125 1,257,531
1863 2,364,395 1,017,198 1,347,197

The proportion of the working charges to the receipts was
thus in 1861, 42 per cent; in 1862, 43; and in 1863, 43.
Few railways in the United Kingdom appear in a better
position than the Midland in respect to working expenses,
the ratio on the 11 other great systems of the empire having
been as follows in 1863 :—Caledonian, 43 per cent; Great
Eastern, 52; Great Northern, 60 ; Great Western, 48 ;
Lancashire and Yerkshire, 47 ; London and North- Western,
46 ; London and South-Western, 51; London, Brighton,
and South Coast, 13 ; Manchester, Sheffield, and Lincoln-
shire, 60 ; North-Eastern, 48 ; and South Eastern, 48. In
no case was the Midland thus surpassed in respect to eco-
nomy of management, and in only one instance—that of the
Caledonian—was it equalled in that highly important matter.
The finance of the Midland appears to be administered
on equally sound principles. The present directors had
rather a heavy legacy of folly bequeathed to them when
Mr lludson quitted the concern, but they have since
steadily and successfully applied themselves to the task of
placing the concern on a satisfactory and substantial foot-
ing. Thus, of the total of £23,377,447 raised by shares and
loans at the close of 1863, no less than £11,230,736, or
nearly one-half, was ordinary stock, and it is worthy of
remark that at the close of 1861 the corresponding total was
only £10,702,502, showing that the directors succeeded in
placing ordinary stock of the company during 1862 and
1863 to the extent of £528,234, the total growth of share
and loan capital during the same period having been
£1,583,373. Considering that 1861, 1862, and 1863 have
been years—the remark applying particularly to 1862—0 f
same commercial depression (although John Bull has
tided over his difficulties much better than might
have been expected), the fact that in 1862 and 1863
ordinary stock of the Midland was taken up to the extent of
£528,234 speaks volumes for the confidence entertained by
the monied public in the stability of the enterprise. After
alt, however, it is not perhaps a matter of surprise, since in
1861, 1862, and 1863 the following excellent dividends were
paid by the Midland upon its ordinary stock-1861, 61 per
cent. on £9,714,019, 5i per cent, on £978,533, and nil on
£9,950 (cancelled shares) ; 1862, 6 per cent. on £9,950,045,
41 per cent, on £978,533, and nil on £9,577 (cancelled
shares); 1863, 61 per cent, on £10,242,626, 6 per cent. on
£978,533 and nil 0n£9,577 (cancelled shares). These results
were achieved in the presence of a very large amount of
preference stock, £7,216,118 figuring under that category
at the close of 1863. The bulk of this preference capital
was outstanding at rates ranging from 4 to 6 per cent., the
latter rate having been paid upon £1,940,903, 41 per cent.
upon £1,853,087, and 4 per cent. upon £2,475,000 ; 8 per
cent, was paid upon £140,000, 61 per cent, upon £145,000,
and 8 per cent. upon £140,000. As to the rate paid upon
X 628,128 of new preference stock, we have no precise infor-
mation. The directors have also succeeded in converting
a large portion of the debenture debt of the company into
debenture stock. £924,907 figuring under that head at the
close of 1863; the rate of interest paid upon this portion of
the capital is fixed at a steady, invariable 4 per cent. The
Midland debenture stock is, doubtless, a solid and reliable
investment, but it may be doubted whether the issue of de-
benture stock will not lead to irregularities and confusion
on the part of some undertakings. Anyhow, the public does
not respond with much alacrity to the constant appeals made
to it to exchange debentures for debenture stock; and even
the Midland had a larger amount of loans outstanding at
the close of 1863 than at the close of 1861. Thus the deben-
ture debt of the company on Dec. 31, 1863, amounted to
£4,005,686, which was floating at the annexed rates of in-
terest:—£l,ooo at 5 per cent., £220,000 at 41 per cent.,
£222,108 at 41 per cent., £3,460,293 at 4 per cent., £98,835
Rat 31 per cent., £2,050 at 31 per cent,, and soo at 2 per