in doctrines, not by accident, but on an
understanding with ecclesiastics of the old religion. Then men
went further, and said that I had actually been received into
that religion, and withal had leave given me to profess myself a
Protestant still. Others went even further, and gave it out to
the world, as a matter of fact, of which they themselves had the
proof in their hands, that I was actually a Jesuit. And when the
opinions which I advocated spread, and younger men went further
than I, the feeling against me waxed stronger and took a wider
range.

And now indignation arose at the knavery of a conspiracy such as
this:--and it became of course all the greater in consequence of
its being the received belief of the public at large, that craft
and intrigue, such as they fancied they beheld with their eyes,
were the very instruments to which the Catholic Church has in
these last centuries been indebted for her maintenance and
extension.

There was another circumstance still, which increased the
irritation and aversion felt by the large classes, of whom I
have been speaking, against the preachers of doctrines, so new
to them and so unpalatable; and that was, that they developed
them in so measured a way. If they were inspired by Roman
theologians, (and this was taken for granted,) why did they not
speak out at once? Why did they keep the world in such suspense
and anxiety as to what was coming next, and what was to be the
upshot of the whole? Why this reticence, and half-speaking, and
apparent indecision? It was plain that the plan of operations
had been carefully mapped out from the first, and that these men
were cautiously advancing towards its accomplishment, as far as
was safe at the moment; that their aim and their hope was to
carry off a large body with them of the young and the ignorant;
that they meant gradually to leaven the minds of the rising
generation, and to open the gates of that city, of which they
were the sworn defenders, to the enemy who lay in ambush outside
of it. And when in spite of the many protestations of the party
to the contrary, there was at length an actual movement among
their disciples, and one went over to Rome, and then another,
the worst anticipations and the worst judgments which had been
formed of them received their justification. A