CHAPTER IX.

POPERY IN AMERICA.

I HAVE already remarked that the finger of God is especially observable in his having repressed the Roman Catholic emigration to the English colonies of North America, even after it had commenced under favourable auspices in the year 1634, for the long period of a century and a half, or until the churches of the Reformation, which were early planted in these colonies, had increased and multiplied and replenished the land.* There appears, indeed, to have been a considerable Roman Catholic emigration to the colony of Maryland during the seventeenth century; for in the year 1690 there were not fewer than six Roman Catholic priests officiating in that colony. Many Roman Catholics also must have emigrated to all the thirteen colonies

* In a manuscript paper which the Rev. Cotton Mather informs us had been circulated among the intending emigrants, previous to their embarkation, containing, "General Considerations for the Plantation of New England," the first is, "That it will be a service unto the church of great consequence, to carry the gospel unto those parts of the world, and raise a bulwark against the kingdom of antichrist, which the Jesuits labour to rear up in all parts of the world." For "what," they add, “can be a better or more noble work, and more worthy of a Christian, than to erect and support a reformed particular church in its infancy, and unite our forces with such a company of faithful people, as by timely assistance may grow stronger and prosper; but for want of it may be put to great hazard, if not be wholly ruined." What a noble design, and how nobly accomplished!

during the eighteenth century; but the number of emigrants of this communion from the United Kingdom was quite insignificant, when compared with the full tide of Protestant emigration from the continent of Europe, as well as from Great Britain and Ireland, during the whole of that period.

The State of Louisiana, which was purchased by the United States' Government from the late Emperor Napoleon, during the peace of Amiens, was originally a French, and, consequently, a Roman Catholic colony; and the banks of the Ohio, and certain of its tributary streams, as well as the upper waters of the Mississippi, and the American shores of the great Canadian lakes, were originally settled by French emigrants from Lower Canada. Since the acquisition of Louisiana by the United States, there has also been a considerable emigration to New Orleans from the South of France; many Gascons having emigrated from Bourdeaux, especially since the termination of the last war, to push their fortunes among their countrymen in that part of America.

The territory of Florida also was a Spanish, and, consequently, a Roman Catholic colony, previous to its acquisition, at a still later period, by the United States. I am not aware of the amount of the population of this territory at the period of its cession to America ; but so early as the year 1769, an emigration of 1500 Greeks and Minorcans was conducted to East Florida, under the superintendence of a Dr. Turnbull.*

Towards the commencement of the present century a considerable number of French refugees, both from France and St. Domingo, settled, chiefly as merchants, shopkeepers, instructors of youth, and professors of music and dancing, in all the Atlantic cities of the American republic; and, during the last twenty-five years, the emigration from France to the United States has been very considerable.

*Holmes' American Annals, sub anno.

According to the Rev. Dr. Schmucker, about onethird of the numerous German emigrants to the United States are Roman Catholics; and Dr. S. adds, that, of all the Roman Catholic immigrants in America, the Germans are the most liberal, and the least unwilling to attend the services of the Protestant clergy. The emigration from Poland, during the last ten years, has been exclusively Roman Catholic.

It is chiefly, however, to the emigration from our own Green Isle that we are to ascribe the rise and progress of Popery in America. The Irish emigration to the United States, during the last twenty-five years, has been prodigious. It has filled the cities with Irish labourers; it has scattered them in thousands all over the Union, especially wherever there were railroads to be constructed, or canals to be dug; and during the recent struggle of the two great political parties of the United States, it has been sufficient to affect the balance of power, and to turn the scale in favour of democracy. Judge Torrey, the present Chief Justice of the United States, who, it seems, is a Roman Catholic,* owes his appointment to the earnest desire of President Jackson to conciliate the Roman Catholics of the Union in favour of his friend and successor, Mr. Van Buren.

The mortality among this class of the population of the United States is quite appalling. A gentleman of experience in such matters, told me that the average duration of life among the Irish immigrants in America is only four years; and a Scotch gentleman, from New Orleans, informed me that not fewer than 500 Irish labourers die annually in that city and its immediate neighbourhood. Allured by the prospect of high

* Of the other six judges of the Supreme Court of the United States, one is an Episcopalian, another a Presbyterian, a third a Methodist, and a fourth a Unitarian. I forget what the other two

are.

At all events they agree to differ in the great point of religion.

wages, they accompany the American contractors down the Ohio and Mississippi rivers to the public or other works in progress in that part of the Union; and through their own reckless and dissipated habits, conjoined with the dreadful unhealthiness of the climate, they are mowed down like the standing corn before the sickle of the reaper.

Something of the same kind occurs in the Atlantic cities, where multitudes of Irish labourers gradually find their way to the southward from New York to Charleston, to labour for a year or two as mere beasts of burden, and then to sink under the deadly malaria of that pestilential clime. Every year of more than ordinary sickliness, large collections are made in Charleston to send the Irish and other poor away from the city to save their lives.*

A numerous detachment of these Irish emigrants is uniformly left in every American State prison on their way to the South and West, to bear testimony, I presume, to the moral and religious character of the Green Isle. Of the twenty-two foreigners received into the State prison at Philadelphia, during the past year, not

*The streets of Charleston used to be ornamented on each side with a row of the beautiful trees called the pride of India; the shade of which was most agreeable in the hot summer. But some medical gentlemen of the place, having one of those public nuisances called theories, persuaded a late Mayor of the city to cut them down, under the idea of their being unfavourable to the health of the inhabitants. To mend the matter, the streets are covered over with a sort of sea-sand, formed of oyster shells, from which the reflection of the sun's rays is almost intolerable. It has since been ascertained that it is safest for a planter in these sickly regions to build his house in the woods, without cutting down a single tree if he can help it; the noxious qualities of the atmosphere being probably neutralized by the exhalations from the foliage. There is always a sickly season after an extensive conflagration in Charleston. The smoke from the inhabited houses counteracts the influence of the malaria; while it is generated powerfully by the exposure of the soil and ruins to the direct rays of the sun.

fewer than thirteen were Irishmen. Of the remainder, three were Englishmen, three Germans, one a Scotchman, one a Frenchman, and one a Dutchman. Of the twentythree foreigners received into the Maryland State prison at Baltimore, during the same period, not fewer than seventeen were Irishmen. Of the rest, one was an Englishman, four were Germans, and one a West Indian creole.

From the preceding enumeration, the reader will be prepared to find a considerable Roman Catholic population in the United States. That population has been more than doubled by immigration from Europe during the last fifteen years, and it now amounts to at least a million.*

The Roman Catholic clergy in the United States consist of 1 archbishop, 11 bishops, and 418 priests.† The following is the distribution of this clerical force.

Charleston

Mobile

No. of
Priests.

Extent of country under the Bishop.

23 New England.

43 New York and New Jersey.

40 Pennsylvania and Delaware.

75 Maryland, Virginia, and D. of.

Columbia.

28 North and South Carolina, and Georgia.

. 10 Alabama and Florida.

* Dr. Breckinridge, of Baltimore, estimates the Roman Catholics in the United States at a million and a half; but suspect he is somewhat of an alarmist on that subject. Dr. Kenrick, of Philadelphia, Titular Bishop of Arath, estimates them at a million; and I should think he has better means of forming a correct estimate. His words are" In his foederatis provinciis ad millionem fere pertingere censemur.”

In the American Almanac for the present year the number of priests is stated to be 478. Probably, therefore, the numbers I have given in the following list are those of the churches; the priests being somewhat more numerous.