f the priests of
Italy, so far as my opportunities enabled me to judge. The subject is
more recondite than the foregoing; the facts are less accessible; and my
statements must partake more of the inferential than did those embraced
in the former branches of the subject.

The first question that arises is, in what light do the priests in Italy
regard their own system? Do they look upon it as an unrivalled compound
of imposture and tyranny,--a cunning invention for procuring mitres,
tiaras, purple robes, and other good things for themselves? or do they
regard it as indeed founded in truth, and clothed with the sanction of
heaven? They are behind the scenes, and have access to see and hear many
things which are not meant for the eye and ear of the public. The man
who pulls the strings of a winking Madonna can scarce persuade himself,
one should think, that the movement that follows is the effect of
supernatural power. The priest who liquefies the blood of St Januarius
by the warmth of his hand or the warmth of the fire, must know that what
he has performed is neither more nor less than a very ordinary juggle.
The monk who falls a rummaging in the Catacombs, or in any of the old
graveyards about Rome, and finds there a parcel of decayed bones, which
he passes off as those of Saint Theodosia or Saint Anathanasius, but
which are as likely to be the bones of an old pagan, or a Goth, or a
brigand, can hardly believe, one should suppose, his own tale. If the
Pope believes in his own relics, what conceptions must he have of Peter?
What a strange configuration of body must he believe the apostle to have
had! Peter must have been a man with some dozen of heads; with a score
of arms, and a hundred fingers or so on each arm; in short, a perfect
realization of the old pagan fable of the giant Briareus. The Pope must
believe this, or he must believe that he gives his attestation to what
is not true. Above all, one can hardly imagine it possible that any man
in whom reason had not been utterly quenched could believe in the
monstrous dogma of transubstantiation. What! can a priest at any hour he
pleases give existence to Him who exists from eternity? Can he enclose
within a little silver box that Almighty One whom the heaven, even the
heaven of heavens, cannot contain? Let a man confess at the bar of the
High Court of Edinburgh that he believes himself to be God, and the
Court will pronounce that that man is insane, and will hold him
inc