Roman Catholics of our
country and age. Any one has a full right to say, "These are productions
of individuals for which we and the Church to which we belong are not
responsible, any more than the Church of England is responsible for all
doctrines and sentiments expressed by writers in her communion! Even the
sentiments above referred to of the present reigning pope, you have no
right to allege as the doctrines of the Church!" But I would again
venture to suggest to every one, who would thus speak, the duty of
ascertaining for himself, whether the sentiments of those who at present
fill the highest places, and which fully justify these devotional
exercises and prayers to the Virgin and the Saints, be not themselves
fully justified by the authorized ritual of the Roman Church. On this
point are supplied, even in this volume, materials sufficiently
diversified and abundant in quantity to enable any one to form a correct
judgment.

By two brief extracts I will now bring this branch of our inquiry to a
close. The first is from the concluding paragraphs of a discourse lately
delivered and {388} published. In principle, the sentiments here
professed apparently admit not only of being identified with those of
the authorized services of the Church of Rome, but also, though not so
naked and revolting in appearance as the doctrines of Bonaventura, Biel,
and the two Bernardins, yet in reality they equally depart from the
simplicity of the Gospel, and are equally at direct variance with that,
its first and its last principle, ONE GOD AND ONE MEDIATOR BETWEEN GOD
AND MEN, THE MAN CHRIST JESUS.

"Remember that this day you have put yourselves and your families under
the protection of the ever-blessed Mother of God, and Her chaste Spouse,
St. Joseph; of those who were chosen of God to protect the infancy of
Jesus from the danger by a persecuting world. ENTREAT THEM TO PROTECT
YOU AND YOURS FROM THE PERILS of a seducing and ensnaring world; to
plead your interests in heaven, and secure by their intercession your
everlasting crown. Loudly proclaim the praises of your heavenly Queen,
but at the same time turn Her power to your everlasting advantage by
your earnest supplications to HER." (See Appendix.)

The other extract, which sanctions to the full whatever offerings of
praise and ascriptions of glory we have found individuals making to the
Virgin and to Saints, is from an announcement in, I believe, the last
English edition of the