It is said that during the last ten years the number of the Roman Catholic laity and clergy, as well as of their churches and chapels, has considerably increased, chiefly, indeed, from the immigration of Irish settlers, but in some respects, as Mr. Bowyer has justly observed, in consequence of the liberty of religious discussion which the Roman Catholics have of late years enjoyed. It was reasonably to be expected, amongst the immediate consequences of the removal of the political disabilities, to which the profession of the Roman Catholic faith had heretofore exposed her Majesty's subjects in England, that some stragglers from the Church of England would seek a refuge in the ranks of the Roman Catholic body. The existing result, however, whatever it may be, has been for the most part brought about not so much by the operation of elements within the Roman Catholic Church, as by causes external and foreign to it, to which it is only necessary to allude on the present occasion, in order that their accidental and abnormal character may not be overlooked.

Mr. Bowyer states that the system of government by vicars apostolic was "avowedly of a mere missionary character, being such as the Church uses in heathen countries, e. g. China, or in countries where she is barely tolerated, and that such a missionary state seemed unworthy of the liberality of this country. It seemed to imply a distrust of the justice and toleration of public opinion."

This is the language of compliment; and if the Pope himself really intended to pay a compliment to the liberality of England, he has been most unfortunate in his choice of measures. But a truce to such trifling! It could never be supposed by any

reasonable person, that this country could wish to see two Churches established in England, because she had come to tolerate, by the side of her national Church, a Roman Catholic community, with a numerous clergy exercising over it episcopal and other functions, such as were really necessary for the religious wants of that community. The voice of the State has never spoken in language which permits such an inference. On the contrary, the practice of England herself should have taught Rome a very different lesson. Highly valued as her own Episcopal Church is by England, she has not sought to set it up on the northern bank of the Tweed by the side of the Established Presbyterian Church of Scotland, but she has been content, as her own legislative act shows (32 Geo. III. cap. 63.), to secure to the Episcopal Communion in Scotland a similar measure of religious toleration to that which she has granted to the Roman Catholic Communion in England. The Protestant Episcopalian Church in Scotland is maintained by the law of the land under the spiritual authority of bishops exercising episcopal functions within given districts, but without any fixed sees or titles recognised by law.

"But a change was required by the constitutional principles of the Church, and for the spiritual interests of the people!" It is not very intelligible what is meant by the constitutional principles of the Church. The constitution of the Roman Catholic body in England before September, 1850, was founded on the regulations of a Brief*, issued by Pope Benedict XIV. in 1753, and known as the "Apostolicum Ministerium," being the words with which it commences.

* Cf. Appendix.

As that constitution was expressly adapted to the system of Vicars Apostolic, there could not be anything in it which required the erection of Episcopal Sees in England. Mr. Bowyer must, therefore, allude to the constitution of the Roman Catholic Church itself, as it exists in other States than England.

There is no doubt, however, that a very considerable change would be required, in order to admit the full system of the Roman Catholic Church into England, and such is Cardinal Wiseman's explanation. According to the statement of his Eminence, a change would seem to have been required in rather than by the constitutional principles of the Roman Catholic Church in England. The choice lay between "another and full constitution which should supply all wants," and “the real and complete code of the Church," in other words, "the entire body of the Canon Law." "It was agreed," he says, "that the old constitution had become a clog and embarrassment rather than a guide." This may have been the case, but if so, it is one of the many signs that the Roman Catholic clergy seek to take up a new position in England, and, with that object, are striving to obtain a more efficient organisation. The Roman Catholics must not be surprised that Protestant England should feel alarm at such signs.

But it is said "that a change was required for the spiritual interests of the people!" It is not very obvious how the spiritual interests of the Roman Catholic body can be affected by a change, which transfers them from the immediate superintendence of the vicars apostolic of the Pope, to the immediate superintendence of a local metropolitan and his suf fragans, more especially, if the ancient vicars are to be themselves the new bishops. For as it has been

already observed, the vicars in the first place possessed all the powers of ordinary bishops, and in the second place had other delegated powers beyond those of ordinary bishops, and, in their special character of delegates of the Holy See, could grant dispensations in certain matters, many of which were of a spiritual nature, which the new bishops will not be able to grant by virtue of their own ordinary authority. Again, the coadjutors of the vicars apostolic, for there were other bishops by the side of the eight vicars, enjoyed a participation in all the faculties and powers of the vicars apostolic, their participation in them being sanctioned by the Holy See itself*, so that the spiritual wants of the Roman Catholic body lacked nothing essential for their legitimate satisfaction.

But it may be said, there are well known differences between a temporary mission and an established church. No doubt, in an ecclesiastical point of view this may not be gainsayed, but there is no spiritual element wanting in a Mission, and it is for the spiritual interests of the people that the change is said to have been required. As far as the decision of the vicars apostolic might need revision, an appeal from them lay in all matters to the tribunal or Congregation of Propaganda Fide at Rome, whose decrees were not received except with the confirmation of the Pope himself. In future, indeed, it may happen, if the decrees of the Council of Trent are to be imported into England under the new arrangement, that the appeal may lie to another tribunal, to wit, the Congregation of the Council of Trent, in

* See Evidence of the Right Reverend N. Wiseman, D.D., Coadjutor to the Vicar Apostolic of the Central District of England, before the House of Lords in the Sussex Peerage, June 25. 1844.

stead of the Propaganda Fide. But this cannot affect the spiritual interests of the Roman Catholics in England, nor can the decrees of Trent well do so, except so far as the introduction of the decrees of that Council would imply that the Roman Catholic Church had developed not merely its episcopal but its parochial system throughout England, as a necessary condition for those decrees to be executed. For instance, in the matter of marriage, the old Canon Law, which merely required a priest to be present to give the benediction of the Church, has hitherto prevailed amongst Roman Catholics in England and even in Ireland till a very recent period. The Decree of Trent, on the other hand, annuls and declares void all marriages which are not celebrated in the presence of the parish priest (coram parocho) and two witnesses. The parish is thus a necessary element in the Tridentine system, and as the decrees of Trent have of late been introduced into Ireland, it may be reasonably presumed, that what has been thought requisite for the spiritual interests of the Irish will not be kept back from the English Roman Catholics. But it is worthy of remark, that much temporal inconvenience in matters of marriage has already resulted to the Roman Catholic laity in Ireland, from the introduction of the decrees of Trent into that kingdom.

On the other hand, as the Brief is silent as to the decrees of Trent, and enjoins, "the aforesaid archbishop and bishops to furnish, at due seasons, reports of the state of their churches to our Congregation of the Propaganda," England seems still to be allowed by the Holy See to remain in the catalogue "of other States than Catholic States." It thus becomes more difficult to understand in what respect her Majesty's