Knoxville Whig and chronicle. [volume] (Knoxville, Tenn.) 1875-1882, 1875-05-05

the pomp and parade in our modes of
worshiping God. Our Protestant
ancestry who came out of the Catho-
lie Church adopted an entirely differ
ent system and simpler modes of
worship. They believed that the
Catholic Church had sunken into a
splendid but dead Journalism, and
that there was no real spirituality in
the Church. For ten centuries be-
fore the reformation the Church
throughout all Europe was dead
but magnificent pageant intended to
strike the senses, but powerless in
effecting the spiritual life of its devo-
tees, and it had sunken into lamenta-
BILE corruption. Indulgencies were
peddled through Italy, France and
Germany until the moral sense of
well-meaning men was shocked.
Then came those enquiries and in
vestigations that resulted in the great
reformation of the sixteenth century.
1t is singular coincidence that ut
the very time the spiritually-minded
in the Catholic Church we're anxious.
ly enquiring for better way to serve
God than was afforded them by the
dead Journalism of the Church that
this Continent was discovered, as if
place of retreat or refuge was provi-
dentially provided for the prosecuted
of the Church who protested against
the crimes, corruptions and despot-
isms of the priesthood, and the spir-
itual lifelessness of the Church.
That great organization known as
the Catholic Church was then the
most venerable and powerful organ
ization in the civilized world. 1t
controlled all the Governments of
Europe, and when the reformation
began to take form in Germany and
the Netherlands, it stretched forth its
strong arm to crush every one who
claimed the right to worship God ac-
cording to the dictates Of his own
conscience, if not in accordance with
the formulas of that Church. This
contest lasted for nearly two CEN
turtles of relentless war. Early in the
contest there was organized the $50
ciety of Jesus" which, from that
time to the present day, has proved so
great q power in that Church, and is
better known as the organization of
the "Jesuits," which is more dreaded
by the Governments of Europe
Catholic and Protestant, than any
other society in Christendom. Amer
lea was the asylum of the hunted and
prosecuted Protestants of Germany
Holland, the Netherlands, France
England and Scotland.
, The question naturally suggests
itself, whether or not, America would
have been peopled at as early a date
, and so rapidly as it was, had it not
been for the prosecuting spirit of the
J Catholic Church? In the opinion Of
t the Church, q hereto, as all Prote
stants were called, was not fit to live
l and it was the duty of the Church to
) extirpate them from the face of the
. earth. Germany, under the Emperor
8 Charles the Fifth, was drenched witt
| the blood of men whose only offenst
: was, that they claimed the right O
: private judgement-the right t.
/ worship God according to the dictates
Q of their own consciences.
"The Church" claimed that it
D through its Pontiffs, Councils anC
: Hierarchy, had the sole right to inter
r pref the Scriptures and order tn,
: modes of worship. For ten centuries
t embracing the time from the fall o
= the Roman Empire, up to the com
t mencement of the sixteenth century
= all Europe was in gross darkness, an,
superstition and ignorance prevailed
The churchmen were almost the onl,
educated men to be found in an,
r country, with few exceptions anon
e the royal families and nobility, in til
= different countries. For the last hal
l. century the Papal Church has bee,
= losing power in Europe, and it
n looking with longing eyes to Amel
y lea, as opening grand field for it
|, Jesuit Missionaries. The Pope
c surrounded by a college of Cardinal