ritual in the Anglican system than in the Roman: in
consequence, my main argument for the Anglican claims lay in the
positive and special charges, which I could bring against Rome. I had
no positive Anglican theory. I was very nearly a pure Protestant.
Lutherans had a sort of theology, so had Calvinists; I had none.

However, this pure Protestantism, to which I was gradually left, was
really a practical principle. It was a strong, though it was only a
negative ground, and it still had great hold on me. As a boy of
fifteen, I had so fully imbibed it, that I had actually erased in my
_Gradus ad Parnassum_, such titles, under the word "Papa," as
"Christi Vicarius," "sacer interpres," and "sceptra gerens," and
substituted epithets so vile that I cannot bring myself to write them
down here. The effect of this early persuasion remained as, what I
have already called it, a "stain upon my imagination." As regards my
reason, I began in 1833 to form theories on the subject, which tended
to obliterate it. In the first part of Home Thoughts Abroad, written
in that year, after speaking of Rome as "undeniably the most exalted
Church in the whole world," and manifesting, "in all the truth and
beauty of the Spirit, that side of high mental excellence, which
Pagan Rome attempted but could not realise,--high-mindedness,
majesty, and the calm consciousness of power,"--I proceed to say,
"Alas! ...the old spirit has revived, and the monster of Daniel's
vision, untamed by its former judgments, has seized upon Christianity
as the new instrument of its impieties, and awaits a second and final
woe from God's hand. Surely the doctrine of the _Genius Loci_ is not
without foundation, and explains to us how the blessing or the curse
attaches to cities and countries, not to generations. Michael is
represented [in the book of Daniel] as opposed to the Prince of the
kingdom of Persia. Old Rome is still alive. The Sorceress upon the
Seven Hills, in the book of Revelation, is not the Church of Rome,
but Rome itself, the bad spirit, which, in its former shape, was the
animating spirit of the Fourth Monarchy." Then I refer to St.
Malachi's Prophecy which "makes a like distinction between the City
and the Church of Rome. 'In the last persecution,' it says, 'of the
Holy Roman Church, Peter of Rome shall be on the throne, who shall
feed his flock in many tribulations. When these are past, the City
upon the Seven Hills shall be destroyed, and the awful Judge