The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1840-10-13 00:00:00

like yours, would be rewarded with the concession of all civil
rights, and if we were base enough to despise or undervalue
the sacred obligation of an oath, we could set pers"ecution at
defiance, and obtain, at once, total emancipation.
This is Mr. O'Connell's appeal to the dissenters, and they
were deceived. Here, then, were the sentiments of this man
addressed to the Protestant dissenters, and what was the
consequence ? The consequence was that it produced, I must
say again, a most unnatural alliance between them. For Pro-
testant dissenters and churchmen, even in the utmost ex-
tremes of difference of opinion upon any other subject,
have on this but one common cause and one common interest
in standing together against the common enemy and oppres-
sor of conscience, of civil and religious liberty, the dethroner
of the Bible from the education of the fellow-men, and the
persecutress of liberty of conscience throughout the whole
world. (Hear.) Therefore, I say this test permitted popery
to escape from all her crimes, and to come out now as she
professed to come out, as the advocate of civil and religions
liberty, to pretend that she was deprived of her political free-
dom merely for a conscientious article of her creed. (Hear.)
Now I believe that this system of imposture by which Roman
Catholics carried their point has so effectually blinded the
nation, that I do not think that that test ever could be set
up in England again. That is my opinion upon the subject
which I take the liberty of faithfully and plainly expressing.
Allow me now just to read the statement and the sentiments
of that most distinguished statesman, Sir Robert Peel, upon
this subject expressed this year. (Hear.) This is quoted—
I believe the speech of the right hon. baronet was delivered
in the House of Commons upon the question of a vote of
censure against ministers—by Mr. Eneas Macdonnell, in a
letter to the Times—
" If it were no longer possible to maintain disabilities in
1829, surely to dream of imposing them now is among the
wildest visions that ever disturbed the imagination. Repeal
the Emancipation Bill ! and what next ? Will you leave to
the Roman Catholics the privileges which they held before
the Relief Bill, and independently of it ? But those privi-
leges (the elective franchise in particular), and the substan-
tial power which they conferred, were the main instruments
by which the Relief Bill was carried. If you are prepared to
withhold those privileges, (and withhold them you must), the
measure you advise is not the mere repeal of the Emancipa-
tion Act, but the retracing all the steps of gradual concession
for a century back, till you remount to penal laws and abso-
lute servitude."
High as is my opinion of this distinguished statesman, I can-
not possibly coincide with the last sentiment here expressed,
as to the imposition of penal laws—if you mean by that the
penalties that were inflicted upon Roman Catholics for con-
scientious adherence to their religion. The penal laws of
persecution I hold in utter abhorrence. (Hear.) But it is
a very different question to say whether protective laws for
British liberty, and Protestant freedom, are to be maintained
or established in this country. It is a very different ques-
tion, whether I am to protect myself from the invasion of
men who will persecute and enslave use, or whether I shall
persecute and enslave them. The one I hold to be a Chris.'
ttan duty ; the other I hold to be an anti-Christian curse.
(Cheers.) Hear again what the right hon. baronet said :
" I have observed, as the law has decreed a civil equality
to all classes in Ireland, without reference to religious dis-
tinctions, the crown ought not, by the interposition of its pre-
rogative, to create practically a difference which the law does
not recognise. I think the crown ought to act on the prin-
ciple of die law, and not make the religious opiuions enter-
tained by any roan the ground of disqualification for the ex-
ercise of civil functions."
Mark how the right hon. baronet himself is caught by the
delusion that Popery has been practising upon the nation,
that she is excluded from political power for a mere religious
opinion. (Hear, hear.) We shall, however, consider this
fact in a few moments. Now, I believe there is a mode free
from all these objections to this test, by which the Protes-
tants of this empire could effectually deliver themselves from
the power of the papacy, and from which they could go a
step further—the only step under God's providence—and
shield their Roman Catholic fellow-subjects from the bon-
dage of Popery too. (Hear.) But to do this you must act
very differently from the manner in which the Protestants of
this empire have acted. It is universally a part of the policy
of Popery for ever to attack. It is a trick of the Jesuits al-
ways to attack their opponents, to throw them upon their
defence, and thereby prevent them from making an attack in
return. If an individual comes forward to attack them, they
do not meet his arguments or proofs, but, by every species
of calumny and falsehood, they blacken his character, and so
they force him away from the object in dispute to defend
himself. (Hear.) So it was with Jezebel M'Neile and for-
gery M`Ghee. (Hear.) This is what they have done
throughout the whole history of this country ; this is what
they are doing at this moment. Show me one single point
on which concession to the Papacy has produced an instant of
peace to this empire. I defy you to do it. What is the fact?
As you have conceded one demand, another and a fresh one has
come forward with greater violence and atrocity. (Cheers.)
Who were the men most insulted and abused by those per-
sons to whom emancipation was granted? (Hear.) There
have not been two men in the empire more insulted or so
much abused, through the malignity of popery, as the Duke
of Wellington and Sir Robert Peel, the very men who granted
emancipation. After emancipation had been conceded then
came the cry fur " Justice to Ireland." Next came the de-
mand for municipal corporations. Municipal corporations
were granted---aye, basely conceded to the Roman Catholics
of Ireland, and then comes out " the repeal of the Union !"
So they go on from one thing to another, till now they are in
an attitude of open hostility, and they are seektng to dismem-
ber the British empire. (Hear.) What is to be done then?
I do not believe you can restore the old test; but I believe
you can put a new test upon them that will go into the very
heart of the papacy. (Cheers.) That is what you must do.
(Hear.) You must now turn and carry the war into the very
heart of Rome ; you must carry it into her politics, her mo-
rals, and her religion ; and so instruct your representatives ;
you must show and prove that the system and priesthood are
identified together in guilt and crime and apostacy from God.
(Cheers.) When I say you must so carry on the war, let me
remember, and do you remember, that the weapons of our
warfare are not carnal—it is not by carnal weapons that we
must conquer, but by the weapons of honest Christian fidelity,
of bold, determined, Christian truth, with the bible in one
hand and the laws of the country (to be founded upon that
bible and to be measured by that bible) In the other. (Great
cheering.) In therefore venturing to propose a new test to
you, and to call upon you for the adoption of this test, I beg
to assure you I do not do so, nor should I presume to do so,
upon my own judgment. I have long deeply considered it.
I have consulted with those who are best informed upon the
subject of the principles of popery; and I know theat there
is not one man in the British dominions who will not think
that the test will be effectual if the Protestants of this
city will take it up, either to deliver themselves from
the papal tyranny, or from what is ten thousand times
more desirable, to deliver their poor Roman Catholic fel-
low-subjects from the tyranny of Rome, and that we may
be permitted to meet together with the bible in our hands,
and to come together to the feet of our Lord and Saviour.
(Hear.) Then, I say, you must takc the crimes of the pa-
pacy, and you must identify them with the faith of the
papacy. You must call upon men to take a test which, when
men read, their consciences must tell them that they can have
no possible right to refuse it. "It seems to me," says
Festus, "unreasonable to send a prisoner, and not withal to
signify the errors laid against him." Now I will send the
accusations with which I charge popery to the British parlia-
ment. The paper contains the test I propose ; it commences

thus :
" Whereas by a certain document of the Church of Rome,
professing to be and commonly received and known as the
third canon of a certain General Council, held in the year of
our Lord 1215, called the Fourth Lateran Council, it is
among other things enacted as follows."
Then is recited the third canon of the Fourth Lateran Council,
which, as it is long, and will be printed for your perusal, I
will not now read, but recommend these two facts concerning
it. First, that you have it on Dr. Doyle's evidence that it
would upturn, if in force, the very foundations of society and
drench our streets and our fields in blood. Secondly, that
you have it proved that it is now set up in Ireland by the
papist prelates as the law for exterminating heretics out of
their dioceses. (Hear, hear.) Now I receite this iniquitous
canon. Then after this is recited, the following canon of the
Council of Trent :
And whereas in the seventh session of the Council of
Trent, the following canon was enacted :
` FOURTEENTH CANON OF BAPTISM.
" If any man shall say that baptised children, when they
•grow up, are to be asked whether they are willing to ratify
what their sponsors promised in their name when they were
baptised, and when they shall answer that they arc not will-
, ing, that they are to be left to their own will, and not to be
compelled to a christian life by any other punishment, unless
that they may be debarred from the reception of the Eucharist
and other sacraments, till they repent, let him be anathema.' "
Here I dare say you will ask, why recite this canoe ? we see
no great evil in this. The reason is, because it contains one
of the deepest, deadliest principles of papal persecution ; and
this canon is stated in the second volume of Dens, is the
standard authority for compelling all men, by corporal pu-
nishment, whenever the pope has the power, to return to the
faith of the church. (Hear.) It says, " Unbelievers who have
been betrayed." Now, young and old, remember this prin-
ciple : there is not one among you not interested in it. This
is one fundamental principle of the Church of Rome, that
every man upon earth that is baptised in the christian church
is made thereby a subject of the Church of Rome • and if he
does not submit to the Church of Rome and acknowledge
her authority, the Church of Rome has a right, whenever she
has the power, to compel him to do so by corporal punish-
ment. This is one of her fundamental principles. Now
listen to this—
" That unbelievers have been baptised, as heretics and
apostates generally, and also baptised schismatics, can be
compelled by corporal punishments to return to the catholic
faith and the unity of the church.
" The reason is, that they by baptism are made subjects of
the church, and therefore the church has jurisdiction over
them, and the power of compelling them, by the ordained
means, to obedience, and to fulfil the obligations contracted
in their baptism.
" This also, obtains in the case of those who have been
baptised in their infancy, or who, compelled by fear or any
necessity, have received baptism ; as the council of Trent
teaches, session 7, canon 14 ; and the 4th council of Toledo,

canon 5J."
Here you see the canon of Trent is quoted as the infallible
authority for this atrocious persecution. I take this out of a
proved standard of the church of Rome by which the Roman
catholic population are to be drilled. I take the canons
which they themselves have quoted as their authority for
compelling Protestants to submit to the dominion of the pa-
pacy, so that there is reason for taking that canon. There is
recited in the text the same principle taken from their funda-
mental standard, the catechism of the council of Trent, thus :
And whereas in the catechism of the council of Trent, the
following principle is laid down on the ninth article of the
creed, speaking of those who are excluded from the church :
" Heretics and schismatics (are excluded), because they
have revolted from the church, nor do they more belong to
the church than deserters belong to the army from which
they have run away. Nevertheless, it is not to be denied
that they are in the power of the church, as persons who can
be called into judgment by her, punished and condemned by
anathema."
Here are their proved canons—their demonstrated principles
from their fundamental standards first recited, then the test
itself is as follows :
And whereas in the aforesaid canons an authority is claimed
by the church of Rome over all baptised persons to submit to
her domination, and to inflict on them pains, penalties, and
persecutions if they refuse to do so. Now
" lA. IL do solemnly, in the presence of God, renounce
and abjure the canons aforesaid so far as they have now been
recited. I believe the same to be immoral, antisocial, into-
lerant, repugnant to the laws of God and to the statutes and
constitution of this realm, and fatal to civil and religious
liberty. I declare that I believe the popes and general coun-
cils who enacted these canons aforesaid were, in so doing,
not only fallible but totally in error, and that they have not
and ought not
,to have any power, weight, or authority over

any conscience."
Here is the test, and now let me ask, is there a single man,
is there a single protestant in this empire that would not
gladly take that test? (Cheers.) I believe rot one. We
believe these canons to be such as I have described. We
hold that the popes and the councils that enacted them were
not only fallible but totally in error. " Oh," but some
Roman Catholic will say, " that is coming to a dogma of my
faith, you point to my conscience, and I cannot admit that."
" What, then," I reply, " you do not deny this canon."
(Cheers.) Then you hold these persecuting principles; you
hold that you have a right to compel us by corporeal punish-
ment to return to the church of Rome ? Then I tell you in
the face of day that you have no such right, and shall have no
such right if I can help it to dictate to me, to rule over my
Conscience or over the conscience of any . one in this empire ?
(Cheers.) You want an equality of civil and religious privi-
leges. Very well. Let us stand upon an equality. Is it not
an equality, that I come to legislate for you when I claim no