the least deteriorates their worship.
The beads have been counted, and an Ave Maria said with each; and what
more does the Church require? Religion as a feeling of the mind, and
devotion as an act of the soul, are unknown to them. I recollect meeting
in the rural lanes leading from St John Lateran to the church of Maria
Maggiore, a small party of Roman girls, who were strangely mixing mirth
and worship,--chatting, laughing, and singing hymns to the Virgin,--just
as Scotch maidens on a harvest field might diversify their labours with
"Home, Sweet Home," or any other air. This irreverent familiarity shows
itself in other ways, after the manner of the ancient pagans, who took
strange liberties with their gods. When the drawing of the lottery is
about to take place, the Romans most devoutly supplicate the Virgin for
success; but should their number come out a blank, they may be heard
reviling her in the open street, and applying to her every conceivable
epithet of abuse.

So far as the moral code of Romanism is concerned, sinless perfection is
no difficult attainment. The commands of the Church are six; and these
six have quite thrown into the shade the ten of the decalogue. They are
the payment of tithes,--the not marrying in the prohibited seasons,--the
hearing of mass on Sundays and festivals,--the keeping of the
prescribed fasts,--confession once a-year at least,--and the taking of
the communion in Easter week. The last two are strictly enforced. On the
approach of Easter, the priest goes round and gives a ticket to every
parishioner; and if these are not returned through the confessional, a
policeman waits on the person, and tells him that he has been remiss in
his religious duties, and must submit himself to the Church's
discipline, which he, the Church's officer, has come to administer to
him in the Church's penitentiary or dungeons. Innumerable are the
methods taken by the Romans to evade confession, among which the more
common is to hire some one to confess for them. Others, though they go,
confess nothing of moment. "You all here believe in the Pope and
purgatory," I remarked to a commissario one day. "A few old women do,"
he replied. "Do _you_ not believe in them?" I asked. "I believe in one
God; but I do not believe in one priest," said he. "I hope you will say
so next time you go to confession," I observed. "I don't confess," he
replied. "How can you avoid confessing?" I enquired. "I pay an old
woman," he answe