The enquirer. [volume] (Richmond, Va.) 1804-1815, 1809-10-06

ceNPTE OF THE rMPrar AND MEMBER OF
THE INSTITUTES TRANCE, IN REPLY TO
HIS LETTER OF THE coLvMsIAp.
Mr. DEAR Coon FRtENp,
IHAvr re ceived your letter.
At once complimentary and critical on the Poem
sent you. Our venerable friend, archbishop
Carroll, informs me that he has like wise recev-
ed from youa copy of the same letter; and he
has expressed to me. in conversation, with the
came frankness that you have done in writing
his dispeasure, at the engraving which has often.
ded YOU
While assure you that sincerely mingle my
regrets with yours and with his on this subject,
permit me, my excellent Gregoire, to accompany
them with few observations that owe to the
cause of truth and to my own bamelss. charac-
ter. Yes, my friend, appeal to yourself, to our
intimate intercourse of near twenty years, when
1repeat this claim of character. 1t cannot be
denied me in any country; and your letter itself,
with all it's expostuiatng severity, is proof
ct the sentiment IN you which justihes nay ap-
peal.
The engraving in question, is gone forth, and
unfortunately cannot be recalled IF had less
dell racy thsn really have towards you and the
ether catholic christians whom you consider as
Ins0,ed BY the prostrstion of their emblems
whicn you therein discover, might content N.Y.
sell with stating, Whist is the fact that this en-
CRAVING and the picture from which It was taken,
were made IN England while was in America !;
and that ] knew nothing of its composition
till it was sent ovcr 20 me not only engraved, but
printed and prepared for publication. Ny porti-
therefore in the crime, II ii is crime is ONLY
the act OF what our lawyers term accompiice
after the fact But my affeclionate regard for an
offended brother, will not suf,r ne tn meet his
complaint with SO short answer. / mus dis.
euss the subject, and reply to the whol- Charge
as though it were all my own promising, as
have already done, that SIN sorry there is coca.
for r.. and hat
yer made.
How much our religious opinions depend on
the place of our birth Had you and been ORR
III the same place, there. is doubt but we
should have been OF the same religion. Had that
place been Constantnople, must have been
musselmen. But now the musselmen call us in
hdeis; pity their weakness and call them in.
hdels IN our turn. 4 was born in a place whsre
catholic christians are not known but by report !;
and the discipline Of our sect taught us to cons-
der them, not indeed AS infidels, but species
OF idoiaters. 1t was believed by us, though cr-
ronsously, that they worshipped images We
now find that they employed them only rs instru-
menls of worship, not as the object. But there
is no wonder that TO the vulgar apprehension of
our people, il shou appear as we were taught
to believe and that those nations who bow the
knee before these embleIns of deity, and address
their prayers to them, should he considered as
really worshipping them. This idea was, perhaps
corroborated by their prayers being uttered in an
Unknown tongue.
The de"alngue Of Moses had inspired us with
an shborreace Tor images, and for those who bow
down 10 them and worship them and hence a
rose our unhappy aversion to the Catholics. We
were told that their churches wee full of pic
lures, statues and other visible representations,
not oh, OF the blsssed virgin, of all the apostle.
and many nj the saints, but Of every person in
the holy trinity. Our fathers had protested a.
gainsi that sreat secten of the christian family
which Calls i;.eIf the mother church, net merely
on account OF tie sale of indulgences, against
which Luther had let the revolt, but like wise on
Account Ut its making these pretended images of
the nina geabe God.
The sect of puritans, in which was born and
educated, and to which still adhere for the same
season that yon adhere TO the catholics, convic-
ton that they are right, the class of refor-
n,ers, who placed themselves at the greatest re.
move from the mother church, and retained the
least respect for her emblems and the other ce.
femonials of her worship. They could suffer no
bishops, no mitres, crosiers, cIucfxes or GEN.
sers they made no professions, carried no light
cd Candles through the street at noon day mel
cher did they leave them burning in their cbur.
shes through the night, when no human eve was
there to see them having entirely lost sight Of
sbis part OF the institutions of Zoroastcr Isis
and Ceres. They would not allow their PRAYERS.
to be written in any language, not even in Latin
though they did not understand it. But thew
chose to ua4rr their suppcations extempore, like
their other GiscourSes, to communicate their >yn
ideas, to express their wants and offer their con-
LESSONS directly to the invisible God through a
mediator indeed, but without holding him in
their hand, or having him fixed in effigy on a cross
before theiI eyes. They had no organs in their
shurches, no instrumental music in their wog ship
which they held to be always profane
These people made of no cross but the
mystical one of Notifying their sins and if thew
had been Gale upon to join in crusade TO the
holy land, they must have marched without a
standard. They would have fought indeed with
as much bravery as saint Louis or the lion Rich
ard but when they had reconuuered the tomb
pf Christ, they would have trampled on the eros.
with as tervent zeal they would upon the
crescent. They were net conversant with what
we call the fine arts; they spoke to the ear. but
rot to the eye and having no reverence for ina
6es or emblems, they despised thosa that had.
though they were doubtless wrong in so DOING.
i mention these things, my worthy friend. not
with the least idea of leyity or evasion but TO
prove to you how totally you have mistaken nv
meaning sad my motive; to slew by what chain
81 circumstances, mostly foreign to our own me.
rits or dement's, our habits Of opinion, our cast Of
character are formed to show how natural il is
that mSn otmy origin and education my course
OF study and the views must have taken of the
morals OF nations, t;ier causes and tendencies.
should attribute much Of the active errors thai
afhict The human FAcs 20 the use of en- bieus and
20 the fatal facility with which they are mistaken
5or realities by the great vulgar of mankind how
the best OF christians Of one sect NAV consider
The christian cmblems Of another sect as byej,fa;
ses OF dangerous tendency, and honestly wish