member
of the last Congress, who, after a violent philippic against the
corruptions of the priests, was found murdered in his chamber. And, as
in case of the inquisitorial assassinations, the crime was proved to
have been connected with a robbery. The power to overawe courts of
justice, proverbially corrupt, and the facilities with which
assassinations are procured, are now the most dreaded weapons of the
Church, and may account for the nominal conformity of the intelligent
classes.

The unbelievers in Mexico, though considerable in numbers, are not
organized with a positive creed. Theirs is only a negative
existence--unbelief; and they are generally found conforming outwardly,
as a more convenient and prudent course than running a tilt with the
well-organized forces of the Church.

There is nothing peculiar in the spiritual powers of the Church of
Mexico, as these powers are common to all Catholic countries, and vary
only with the ignorance and brutality of the people; the more degraded
the people, the greater is the power of the priest and bishop. The
intelligent Catholic, educated among Protestants, looks upon his priest
as a religious instructor, and interprets the _ego te absolvo_ as
rather a matter of form, meaning little more than that he will
intercede for him. He has caught and is applying a Protestant idea
unwittingly. But with the gross multitude who constitute the mass of
the Spanish-American population, the priest is the God of the people;
his giving or withholding absolution is a matter of life or death; and,
however corrupt and debauched he may be, he still holds jurisdiction
over the pains of hell and the bliss of heaven. For a reasonable
consideration in money, he will shut up the one and open the other. The
offering in the mass of the bloodless sacrifice of Jesus Christ, as it
is called, is not sufficient for the Catholic in a Protestant country,
but the priest must also preach a sermon every Sabbath, like a
Protestant minister, though he still holds to the efficacy of the mass
in conferring blessings on the living and the believing dead. The
preaching of the priest is a rare thing in an exclusively Catholic
country. The mass is his livelihood, and if he be the head of a
community, or a popular priest, he often makes a profit in taking in
masses to say, and letting out the job at a discount. The whole matter
may be summed up by saying that the more profoundly ignorant the people
are, the more devoti