When your correspondent shall have reconciled these passages, it will probably be necessary to support his character for honesty, to explain why, in urging this argument, in his first note to paragraph 25, he made two serious faults, in alluding to the texts mentioned in a note to the Doway Bible-and makes a very serious mistake by printing "chapter iii. 8, 7," for, "chapter xxxviii. 7," which is in the American stereotype edition, instead of xxxvii. 7, which is correct, and usual; I acquit him of all intention of dishonesty in this portion, and look upon it to be your printer's error, though we will not be allowed the mistake of a comma. He then proceeds.

"The reader, it is hoped, will turn to these passages, and see if they authorize anything like the Roman Catholic use of images in their churches. Venite adoremus is the express language of the Roman Missal: Come let us adore. Thou shalt not adore or serve them, is the language of their *ranslation of Scripture. Roman Catholics will say they are not served; will they say that they are not adored? The language of the passage, as quoted by themselves, is, adore nor serve; not adore and serve.

The first fault is what logicians call the sophism of drawing a universal conclusion from particular premises-which denotes either a defect in the head, or one in the heart of him who uses it. The words venite adoremus which he quotes are used only on one day in the year, and confined to the exhibition of one image, and can by no means whatever be applied to any other. They are used on Good Friday at uncovering the image of Christ crucified. Now from his construction of this paragraph, the application is made to appear general for all images, of "the Virgin and other saints," and his context appears to put these latter and only these forward; for the paragraph begins with "In this adoration then, this due honour and veneration given to the images of the Virgin Mother of God and the saints, in their churches, do Catholics violate the second of God's commandments." Now I would be fully justified by every rule of fair criticism to restrain the meaning of his note to the extent of his paragraph, and if I did, that extent would not only not reach, but would exclude the image of Christ. Upon this ground he would be more criminal either against sound reason, or plain honesty, because he applies to images of one class, the words used not by any means for them, but for a class altogether different.

His second fault was, that with the evidence before him of the meaning and intent of the church, he not only wilfully suppressed it in this essay, though he gives it after the lapse of a month in the next, but suggested the very opposite. In pages 228, 229, of the Missal from which he quoted, the following note is appended at the very passage which he quotes.

"The intention of the Church in exposing the cross to our veneration on this day, is, that we might the more effectually raise up our hearts to him who expired thereon for our redemption. Whenever, therefore, we kneel or prostrate ourselves before a crucifix, it is Jesus Christ only whom we adore, and it is in him alone that our respects terminate.''

What now are we to think of his honesty? I have printed the words as they are printed in the Missal. Even if he had not seen this note, he had in the garbled extract itself, which he says he took from Father Paul, of the decree of the Council of Trent, the distinction between the image of Christ and the images of the saints, in the separate verb applied to each: to Christ, adoremus; to the saints, veneremur; and he had also the very preposition which condemned him of dishonesty all through, ut per imagines Christum adoremus, "that through the images we might adore Christ," (par. 23), and therefore it was, that he laboured in paragraph 27, to prove that the pagans did not adore idols, but God through the idols, that he might put them on very much the same footing with us. Again, he charges us with suppressing "thou shalt not adore nor serve," and yet he quotes the very words from our own Bible!! This is one way of suppressing!

After having got through this task, I shall propose to him another effort at reconciling himself to himself. In paragraph 27. The heathens are very much upon the same footing with the Roman Catholics, because he says, the assertion of the Council of Trent is not true, that they "worshipped anything above their idols." There is, he says, abundant evidence on the contrary that they did,—they adored something above the images through the images,-they worshipped God through the images. If in this they are upon very much the same footing with Roman Catholics, these latter must therefore worship God through the images, and thus God is the object of the Catholic adoration. Yet, in paragraph 24, he labours to show that Catholics do adore images, and pictures, and in paragraph 25, he asserts that they violate the second of God's commandments in this adoration given to the images: and in the note, he triumphantly asks will Roman Catholics say that the images are not adored in their churches?

After he has reconciled his assertion that it is God we adore through the image, with his assertion that it is the image we adore-he will still have to reconcile two others, viz.: that in paragraph 23, where he says that a distinction is due in our favour over the heathen, with that in 25, where he asserts that we worship the image; from which gross idolatry he vindicates the heathen in paragraph 27, thereby preferring the heathen worship as more pure than ours.

The only topic of his second essay which I have not now disposed

of, is that which he takes up in the second note to paragraph 25, and which he more specially treats of in paragraph 26. In which, his object is to show that we are not misrepresented when it is alleged "that sensible that our practice is contrary to the second commandment; we have in several of our Catechisms omitted the second, and to keep up the number, split the tenth into two." The first fault of your correspondent is, that he begs the question, by assuming that what he calls the second commandment is not a part of the first.

I shall not prolong a contest which has far exceeded in length my original plan, by taking up this question at large. I shall merely remark in the first place, that neither God nor Moses divided the law, containing the precepts, in the one way or in the other, and that if we give the entire of the law itself, as Bishop Stillingfleet attests, or as your correspondent attests-I care not which, (par. 26,) in our Vulgate and Doway Bibles, which are our standards of Latin and English, it cannot be fairly said that we omit that which we actually print. "But we omit it in our Catechisms." Our object could not be to mislead, for if it was, we would act very absurdly by printing it in our Bible. But does your correspondent mean to assert by the words, "and as it is printed in the Septuagint, the Vulgate, and the Doway Bible, and so forth," that these Bibles do divide the law into ten heads, and place this the second? For if he does, he asserts what is not the fact. The Bible has no such division, no Bible ever exhibited the division. In the next place; the division of this law into ten heads was a human institution of convenience, and it would be just as fair for me to state that they are only three commandments, or only two commandments as that they are ten. In the first case, I would divide the law into the precepts regarding the worship of God, the external conduct of man to his neighbour, and the regulation of his own desires. In the second case, I would divide it as our Saviour did, into the duties towards God, and those towards man, and yet having only two or three commandments, I would still omit no part of the law. In the third place. The division which we adopt, was that which was universally adopted and followed by the Christian Church, at and before the beginning of the sixteenth century. Your mode of dividing has been subsequently taken by the gentlemen whom you call Reformers, for the purpose of having the appearance of a plea to convict us of violating a commandment, by giving to a part of the first, a meaning which I have shown it cannot sustain. Fourthly, our Catechisms do not profess to give the words, but the substance of the law, and therefore, as we conceive what you call the first and second to be only one ordinance, commanding the worship of God, which the pagans neglected, and forbidding

idolatry which they practised, we do not make two separate recitals of what we look upon to be only one precept; and yet we are guilty of no omission, because we give all the words of the law in the Bible where we profess to give them. Fifthly, we find a prohibition of impure acts, followed by a prohibition of theft, and as they are sins of various kinds, and separately prohibited, so we follow the same order in the prohibition of desire to act impurely, and desire to act dishonestly, and we look upon the desires of impurity and injustice, to be as distinct in their moral nature, as are the external acts. Sixthly. Whether we be right or wrong in this mode of division, we are not the originators of the division or omission. I need only to take your own evidence or that of your correspondent to acquit us; for he tells us, (note 2, to par. 25), that others had done so before us, both in the Jewish and early Christian churches. Why then make us the criminals if the crime was committed before we were born? We get two reasons from him, and most notable ones they First reason, "Their authority was not paramount.

are.

The question is not concerning authority, but concerning fact. The question of fact is, "whether Roman Catholics omitted the second commandment, and split the tenth into two for the purpose of not having it exist as a reproof of their idolatrous practice." Mark the notable answer. Yes they did because, though the Jews did it innocently before Christianity existed, yet the Roman Catholics, who received those precepts from the Jews as a divine law, were criminal, because the authority of the Jews was not paramount!!! And the early Christians innocently did it, but yet the Roman Catholics are criminal in doing so, and it was the Roman Catholics who alone were guilty of the omission, because the authority of the early Christians was not paramount!!! Who will now dare to say that your correspondent is not pellucid?—I must match paramount if I can. Really, a person who does not after this, clearly see, that the Catholics were the persons who first omitted the second commandment, must be unable to see through a block of granite!

Finding, however, that the proof will by no means sustain, what is the only conclusion that should be established for his purpose, viz.That this omission was made first by Roman Catholics, he comes upon the principle of cy pres, as near the mark as he can, by sustaining his feebleness upon an unfounded and uncharitable allegation, "nor was their purpose sinister." Thus what the Jews and early Christians did without a sinister purpose according to the paragraph, is proof that the Roman Catholics, who afterwards did it, were the only persons guilty of omission!!! Call you this logic? Really, this puts to shame the wolf,

who, when he was obliged to acquit the lamb because of non-age, alleged that his father committed the crime, for which he should suffer; you will not admit that Jews or Christians are to save us, though both have innocently done what you call our crime, but you find that we are too young to be Jews, though we are in truth those same "early Christians," whom you acquit of any sinister intention, though you condemn us for our sinister intention. Pray, will you ask your correspondent to reconcile his acquittal of the Jews and of the early Christians, who divided the law as we do, with his condemnation of us, and with his statement in paragraph 26?

"Now it may be offensive to Roman Catholics, that Protestants should say they make this omission, because they are sensible that it is called for in aid of the authority of their church, in ordering such adorations as they are required to pay to images; and Protestants may possibly err in assigning this motive for the omission; but as they can see no other, and hold the fact of the omission to be indisputable, they surely are not justly censurable, either for the assertion of the fact, or their manner, so reasonable, of accounting for it."

Can he not see another reason, in our following the Jews and the early Christians?

I now ask any candid person, who has had the patience to read my explanations, whether I was justly censurable for stating in my letter to Bishop Bowen, that it was a misrepresentation of our doctrine and practice to assert:

"1.

That Roman Catholics pray to angels and saints to save them by their merits, making those angels and saints mediators with Christ, or in his stead.

"2. That Roman Catholics dishonour Christ, our only mediator. "3. That Roman Catholics give to creatures the worship due to God alone, and are thus guilty of direct idolatry.

"4. That Roman Catholics worship the blessed Virgin mother of our Lord, in such a way as to commit downright idolatry.

"5. That Roman Catholics worship the images or pictures of the Virgin Mary, and of other saints.

"6. That Roman Catholics violate the second of God's commandments without scruple.

"7. That notwithstanding such violation without scruple, Roman Catholics seem to be sensible that their practice is contrary to the said second commandment.

"8.

That therefore in several of their catechisms, the Roman Catholics leave out the second commandment, and to make up the number, they split the tenth into two.

"9. That Roman Catholics, in excusing themselves from idolatry