Protestant Ascendancy

“ Power. We speak from an intimate and perfect knowledge of the common Protestant sentiment on this matter, and with a distinct remembrance of the dread which these last three names, and the veneration which the first of them, inspired. Every one who knows what the almost universal sentiment of the Protestant community respecting the Catholic religion and its hierarchy was, is well aware that it was a sentiment of intense abhorrence mingled with fear. ”

“ Catholics may have more than Protestants, but in no case have they or can they have less. By what rule or standard, then, do Protestants judge the Catholic understanding of the Scriptures to be false and the Protestant understanding to be true? Private judgment is no rule, and, if it were, Catholics have private judgment as well as Protestants; they have, too, reason, Biblical, historical, and all other sorts of learning, as well as they, and, at least, in as eminent a degree. By what rule or standard of judgment, then, is Protestantism to be pronounced more Biblical than is Catholicity? ”

“ We are not surprised that our Protestant fellow-citizens love to point with commendable pride to the example of their great and good co-religionist, though Protestantism, particularly that professed in his day, and by his family and associates, had little to do with the formation of his character or the regulation of his public actions; but as Catholics we yield to none in admiration and affection for the noblest citizen of our common country. ”

“ As respects public worship, while perfect equality was not established, the dispositions were such as to bring it within the power of a Protestant in any part of the kingdom to meet his fellow-believers for the holiest of acts, at least from time to time. ”

“ Mankind, you will tell me, evasively. But I reply: Are not the immense mass of Protestants also a part of mankind? and do not they live quite differently? Worshipping the same Deity, followers of the same gospel, their temples are truly the house of prayer; their Sundays the Lord's-day, their ministers patterns of probity and morality. Can this be denied concerning the Protestant clergy in general? But against the Roman Catholic clergy thousands of accusations can be most justly made. ”

“ But though my acquaintance with the Roman Catholic Clergy is very limited, yet the few I do know could not be mentioned as exceptions to what I have just said of the Protestant; and, exclusive of all personal knowledge of the men, it is natural to think that the habitual performance of the ceremonies of the Christian religion, though intermingled with some superstitious rites, and the preaching the doctrines of benevolence and good-will towards men, must have some influence on the lives and characters of those who are thus employed. ”

“ Statesmen, as well as theologians, often felt the need of strengthening the whole Protestant body by an organised harmony among its several members, something akin to that which gives the Roman Catholic Church so imposing an aspect of general unity. ”

“ But the central phenomenon of the sixteenth century is the culmination of the Protestant movement in its decisive proclamation by Luther. For nearly three hundred years already the power of the Church had been declining, and its function as a civilizing agency had been growing more and more obsolete. ”

“ When the church seemed to be departing from its spiritual dignity and defiling its ceremonial by the superstitions and the prodigies of heathenism, or when its pontiffs seemed to have adopted all the vices of secular princes and to have exchanged totally the church for the world, there were rarely wanting advocates of a purer Christian order, advocates whose denunciations might rival in vehemence those of a modern protestant. ”

“ The Jesuits, who, with all their tricks, are often chimerical, thought that by gaining over five or six lords, they would change all that Protestant mass, which is Protestant not only by belief, but also by interest, habit, and manner of living ”

“ But many of its leaders have been among the glories of the Church of England, and I could never speak of them with disrespect.
Catholicism, whether Roman or Anglican, stands to lose heavily by the decay of institutionalism as an article of faith. It is becoming impossible for those who mix at all with their fellow-men to believe that the grace of God is distributed denominationally. The Christian virtues, so far as we can see, flower impartially in the souls of Catholic and Protestant, of Churchman and Schismatic, of Orthodox and Heretic. ”

“ There is no denying the fact. The variations of Protestantism, even during the lives of the reformers, the multiplication of Protestant sects, all appealing alike to the sacred text, and the experience of three hundred and more years, render it indubitable. Hard pressed by their Catholic opponents, Protestants were driven to the sad alternative of either condemning their separation from the Church and returning to her communion, or of giving up dogmatic religion as unessential and falling back on interior feeling or sentiment. ”

“ From the Reformation till the latter part of the last century, we are told, the Protestant Church dwelt chiefly on the human side of Christ, and since that time many works have been written to show how the two—perfect Deity and perfect manhood—were united in His character. ”

“ Protestants, in general, are better instructed in the principles of their religion than Catholics; the reason is obvious; the doctrine of the former requires discussion, of the latter a blind submission; the Catholic must content himself with the decisions of others, the Protestant must learn to decide for himself ”

“ All these causes no doubt are operative; but the real cause, we apprehend, is to be sought in the ascendency acquired by the world in the fifteenth century, and which has invaded Catholic nations hardly less successfully than Protestant nations. Protestantism is the child of this ascendency, and its legitimate tendency is to place the world above heaven, and man above God; or the complete supremacy of the secular over the spiritual. ”

“ Protestant by the conversion of either native or foreign races within its confines. With one only exception, as a class, that may be reckoned considerable, Protestantism is only an heirloom in families that were Protestant at the time of their immigration. Nor has it, with these, held its own; for the statistics supplied by our Catholic bishops show that, among those confirmed by them, a proportion, varying in different dioceses, but forming an average of probably twelve per cent., is composed of converts from Protestantism. ”

“ They create, as with the Protestant clergy, a stronger feeling of mutual sympathy, a greater community of ideas and sentiments; while they also tend to diminish pastoral authority, and to check the reverential respect involuntarily shown to those who, from noble and lofty motives, make the sacrifice of the purest joys granted to mankind. ”

“ Every honest Protestant should, as far as possible, be made to understand this, so that he may understand the risk he runs if he remains in the ranks of Protestants; and every Catholic should be made to understand it, so that he may see clearly that, if he yields to the seduction of Protestantism, he severs himself completely and entirely from Christ our Lord, and insures his eternal perdition. ”

“ It granted to the Protestants full private liberty of conscience. It also permitted them to enjoy public worship in all places where the right was already established. Protestant lords of the highest rank could celebrate [Pg 318] divine service in their castles with any number of their retainers. Nobles of the second rank might maintain private worship in their mansions, to which thirty persons could be admitted. Protestants were pronounced to be eligible to public office. ”

“ But even on this business it must be observed that the Protestant Establishment does not interfere with the Catholic modes of faith; they may preach up and believe in what they please. In this they are not only fully tolerated, but are also protected in their worship, so that on this score they can have nothing to complain of. ”

“ They were drawn indeed by Protestants, but by men who also earnestly professed to hold with the old Catholic doctors and disavowed any purpose to depart from their teaching, and who further had to meet the views and gain the assent of men who were much less Protestant than themselves—men who were willing to break with the Pope and condemn the abuses associated with his name, but by no means willing to break with the old theology. ”

“ The Protestant world has been, from its infancy, in the sixteenth century, in thorough accord with the Catholic Church, in keeping "holy," not Saturday, but Sunday. The discussion of the grounds that led to this unanimity of sentiment and practice of over 300 years, must help toward placing Protestantism on a solid basis in this particular, should the arguments in favor of its position overcome those furnished by the Israelites and Adventists, the Bible, the sole recognized teacher of both litigants, being the umpire and witness. ”

“ Whilst the Protestant world evinces so profound an interest in these Catholic productions, we feel that the Catholics of the country should have within their reach arguments unanswerable by the opponents of our religion, placing it in an impregnable position, whilst they expose the utterly indefensible condition to which they have reduced Protestantism. ”

“ The Protestants talk a great deal about Catholic priests, but I believe they are much more honest in the sight of man, and will do more for their pay, than. any Protestant minister you can find. You will find them up at five o'clock in the morning, saying mass, and attending to what they consider are their religious duties—visiting the sick, and going among fevers and plagues, where Protestant ministers, dare not go. ”

“ Extremely zealous for the Protestant religion, he was always ready to undertake its defence against the partisans of the Romish church. He passionately desired to unite the Protestants, particularly the Lutherans, with the Reformed, and he frequently consulted the ministers of Geneva, Holland, and Berlin, on this subject. ”

“ Protestant, countries that the absurd anomaly exists of a priesthood which pretends to the service of the Jesus who had not where to lay his head, and which at the same time openly claims to belong to “society” and the well-to-do classes, and would resent any imputation to the contrary. ”

“ As the great interest of the Middle Ages, in an historical point of view, centres around the throne of the popes, so the most prominent subject of historical interest in our modern times is the revolt from their almost unlimited domination. The Protestant Reformation, in its various relations, was a movement of transcendent importance. The history of Christendom, in a moral, a political, a religious, a literary, and a social point of view, for the last three hundred years, cannot be studied or comprehended without primary reference to that memorable revolution. ”

“ If popery judges men in meats, protestantism does the same in drinks and in the sabbath; they both judge men in holy-days and movable feasts; and though protestantism repudiates the worshipping of angels, it proclaims in its fasts, preparations, concerts etc., a voluntary humility, and celebration of "saints and martyrs," renowned in legendary tales for "the pride that apes humility." Let the reader search the Scriptures from beginning to end, and he will nowhere find such systems of faith and worship as those comprehended in the papal and protestant systems. ”

“ This gives us the length of the Protestant age.”—Biblical Trace of the Church, p. 143.
In the few years prior to 1880 A.D., there was a great declension in the spirituality of Protestantism. Who can deny this fact? Quite a number of the leading denominations held revivals, where was witnessed [pg 463] the power of the Holy Spirit. People were genuinely converted. They loved and worshiped God in quite a degree of simplicity and equality. The ministry was of a humbler class and more devoted to its charges. In the decade preceding 1880 there was a great change. ”

“ In the Protestant establishment, all are on a free equality; and the religion is an element fused into the life. With the Catholics, the overwhelming authority of the Church invests the priests with godlike attributes ”

“ All Protestantism, even the most cold and passive, is a sort of dissent. But the religion most prevalent in our northern colonies is a refinement on the principle of resistance: it is the dissidence of dissent, and the protestantism of the Protestant religion. ”

“ The main spirit of Protestantism, then, has always been to declare every man independent of the divine authority of the Roman Catholic Church and to substitute for this divine authority a human authority. ”

“ This is the principal reason why the Protestants who remain attached to their Church do not increase so fast as the Catholics. But in common minds, daily scenes, the example of the majority, the power of imitation, decide their habits, religious as well as civil. ”

“ Instead of these abuses, Protestantism sets the power of conscience above the magistrate, and the authority of the word of God above the visible church. In the first place, it rejects the civil power in divine things, and says with the prophets and apostles, ‘We must obey God rather than man.’ In presence of the crown of Charles the Fifth, it uplifts the crown of Jesus Christ. ”

“ A number of those sections of the old Empire which were most highly developed economically and most favoured by natural resources and situation, in particular a majority of the wealthy towns, went over to Protestantism in the sixteenth century. ”

“ The Roman Catholic Church was then, as it is now, a great democracy. There was no peasant so humble that he might not become a priest, and no priest so obscure that he might not become Pope of Christendom; and every chancellery in Europe, every court in Europe, was ruled by these learned, trained and accomplished men,—the priesthood of that great and dominant body. What kept government alive in the Middle Ages was this constant rise of the sap from the bottom, from the rank and file of the great body of the people through the open channels of the priesthood. ”