shall
judge the people.'" Then I append my moral. "I deny that the
distinction is unmeaning; Is it nothing to be able to look on our
Mother, to whom we owe the blessing of Christianity, with affection
instead of hatred? with pity indeed, aye, and fear, but not with
horror? Is it nothing to rescue her from the hard names, which
interpreters of prophecy have put upon her, as an idolatress and an
enemy of God, when she is deceived rather than a deceiver? Nothing to
be able to account her priests as ordained of God, and anointed for
their spiritual functions by the Holy Spirit, instead of considering
her communion the bond of Satan?" This was my first advance in
rescuing, on an intelligible, intellectual basis, the Roman Church
from the designation of Antichrist; it was not the Church, but the
old dethroned Pagan monster, still living in the ruined city, that
was Antichrist.

In a Tract in 1838, I profess to give the opinions of the Fathers on
the subject, and the conclusions to which I come, are still less
violent against the Roman Church, though on the same basis as before.
I say that the local Christian Church of Rome has been the means of
shielding the pagan city from the fulness of those judgments, which
are due to it; and that, in consequence of this, though Babylon has
been utterly swept from the earth, Rome remains to this day. The
reason seemed to be simply this, that, when the barbarians came down,
God had a people in that city. Babylon was a mere prison of the
Church; Rome had received her as a guest. "That vengeance has never
fallen: it is still suspended; nor can reason be given why Rome
has not fallen under the rule of God's general dealings with His
rebellious creatures, except that a Christian Church is still in that
city, sanctifying it, interceding for it, saving it." I add in a
note, "No opinion, one way or the other, is here expressed as to
the question, how far, as the local Church has saved Rome, so Rome
has corrupted the local Church; or whether the local Church in
consequence, or again whether other Churches elsewhere, may or may
not be types of Antichrist." I quote all this in order to show how
Bishop Newton was still upon my mind even in 1838; and how I was
feeling after some other interpretation of prophecy instead of his,
and not without a good deal of hesitation.

However, I have found notes written in March, 1839, which anticipate
my article in the _British Critic_ of October, 1840, in which