The morning star and Catholic messenger. [volume] (New Orleans [La.]) 1868-1881, 1871-11-26

Pastoral Letter 9f the PisshSoRs sb te'
Before us, ON our desk, lies the Pastora
o Letter of the Bishops of the Protestant
y Episcopal Church, who lately assembled il
9 Convention at Baltimore. Though not o
those, to whom the letter has been nd
: dressed, we have taken the liberty of read
ing it-carefully and, if critically, certain
ly in no unkindly spirit;-and now we take
the further liberty of giving our "opinion'
of its contents.
Tho writer's of the Letter claim to be
successors of the Apostlcs-and as such,
claim the right to teach their flocks Truth
and to guard them against error. All Pro-
testant denominations outside the Episco-
pal church, and all Catholics, who are still
farther outside that church, deny the Apos-
tolical Succession claimed by those gentle
men; and believe that they have no more
special right to teach religion, than any
other man who happens to take q notion
to teach it and has the fortune to find a
flock to listen to him.
All Protestant Churches and the Catholic
Church, widely and essentially as they
differ, are a unit, upon this point, against
| the Episcopal Church. That is,-nine
tenths of all the Christians in the world
deny the credentials of the teachers in the
Episcopal Church.
An overwhelming majority-that.
However we waive, for tho present, the
discussion of their claims in order to dis
cuss their letter.
They are gentlemen of high standing, of
unquestioned social position, of admitted
intellectual attainments, of vast influence.
In wealth, in elegance and in culture, if
not in numbers, the Episcopal Church
stands, confessedly, first, in this country.
Pastoral letter is addressed. 1t is issued
at the close of solemn council and it
treats of the solemn interests of immortal
souls. -----
Considering, therefore, those who wrote
the letter, those to whom and for whom it
was written, the circumstances in which it
was composed, the subjects which it treats
and the objects at which it aims,-we must
expect and we do expect that the Letter
will, in every way, be eminently worthy
of it's Apostolic origin, its Apostolic end
and its Apostolic aim.
BasABlessed are they who expect not
because they shall not be disappointed.
In this strange world what isis seldom
what ought to be.
So we are disappointed and yet, at Sec
ond thought, we are not disappointed. For
in the Catholic sense, that Protestant Epis-
copal Pastoral letter is just what it ought
to be /; and it ought to be just what it is I!
Its first, patent merit is its brevity.
Brevity, you know, kind reader, is the soul
of wit.
IT'S always q blunder to say too much.
But it is sometimes something worse
than blunder to say too little. Brief as
it Isl that letter bears upon its face the
awkward look of blunder for having said
too much-about the Catholic Church. And |
brief as it is it bears the still m ore amusing
ly awkward expression for having said too
little-about the Episcopal Church.
When men do not exactly know what to |
say when they have many opinions
about any one subject and they do not like
to commit themselves to any opinion"
that might conflict, seriously to their own
interests, with somebody else's opinion,
the bes. policy is to say nothing at all-or
to say so very little as to mean almost no.
thing at all.
In such Il quandary Silence is the safest,-
but if something must be said ,-why,-
"t the least said the soonest mended."
The Bishops had to say something about |
themselves. Their peculiar position and
their opinions cautioned brevity. And
they were brief.
The Bishops had to say something. III
was their duty to say little. 1t was their
danger to say too much. And yet they
Numbered in their daty of saying a little
by saying too little; and, by some unac-
countable fatality, they also fell into the |
Il fhaxre l,,,