as kneeling before his Mother in Heaven, and setting an example of filial obedience!*

The women into whose feverish heads these fancies entered may have been as crazy as Joanna Southcott, when they spake of themselves, and were not (which others of the same class plainly were) the tools or accomplices of a knavish confessor: but what shall be said of those persons, high in authority, who set their official stamp upon such things, that they might pass for sterling truths? Long ago, Sir, the remark was made, that when any new doctrine

passando delante de su Madre hincò sus rodillas, y baxando la cabeça con amor y reverencia, digna del que fue exemplo de la obediencia y respeto con que han de tratar los hijos a los padres, la saludò."-Vida y Revelaciones de S. Gertrudis la Magna, 1. iii. c. xix. p. 128. Madrid. 1689.

* "The Heavens are terrified, the Angels tremble, all creatures stand astonished, whole Nature is amazed at the birth of this Great-Little-Man-God into the world, whilst you, O Blessed Virgin Mother! remain undaunted, and not only lodge him in your bosom, receive him into your embraces, refresh him with your breast-milk, but moreover, with an unparalleled confidence you make him pay for his entertainment, asking no less a reward for his nine months lodging than the grant of a general and universal peace to the world, Glory for the heavenly inhabitants, Grace for earthly criminals, Life for the dead, a strict league between the Church militant and triumphant, and a perpetual alliance of his divine person with our human nature."-Jesus, Maria, Joseph.

was to be established in your Church, any fresh device of man's invention to be added to the corruptions of Christianity, signs and wonders in abundance were produced to give it credence. One wickedness drew on another; fictions which had been invented in wantonness of mind, opinions which had been thrown out in the sport of a subtle intellect, or advanced in the heat of argument, or of declamation, were maintained with deliberate falsehood; and the dreams of folly, or the ravings of delirium, were attested as solemn and sacred truths, with all the hardihood of confirmed impiety. The history of every corruption in the Papal Church, in other words, of every doctrine wherein it differs from the Reformed Churches, may supply proofs of this.

We shall find enough in the subject which is immediately before us. Here, Sir, are some of the tales by which that figment was supported which takes from the Redeemer his attribute of mercy, and invests the Virgin with it in his stead. A holy Cistercian, by name Wichelm, was rapt in spirit before the tribunal of Christ, when our Lord was so full of wrath against this sinful world, that he commanded one of his Angels to sound a trumpet. The trumpet was sounded, and the world shook like a leaf upon

a tree that is shaken by the wind. Our Lord
bade the Angel sound a second time, which if
he had done, the globe must have fallen to
pieces: the whole host of Heaven awaited this
catastrophe in fear; but the Virgin rose from
her seat and prostrated herself before her Son,
and by her intercession, though he hesitated at
granting it, obtained a respite for mankind.*.
A Franciscan novice, who in like manner was
rapt in a dream, saw the world cited for judge-
ment before our offended Lord: the books were
cast up before him, and the balance of its
offences was so great, that, taking the globe
in his hand, he cast it into the abyss for punish-
ment. At this the Novice cried out, Holy
Mary, help! and the Virgin, rising in time from
her seat, caught the earth, knelt before her
Son, presented it to him, interceded for it, and
obtained a respite upon her promise that it
should be amended and reformed. The Novice
awoke in such fear that he expired as soon as
he had told his tale; and the truth of what he
said was confirmed by an earthquake which,
at the moment when he uttered the cry, shook
the city, and threw down many houses, and
destroyed many people.t... A shepherd boy

*Cæsarius, l. ii. c. xviii. Quoted in Andrade, p. 500.
St. Anton. 3 p.
Hist. Lit. xii. § 63. ib.

saw our Lord, upon his Mother's intreaty, sheathe the sword of justice which he had drawn and he also died to attest the truth of ; his declaration.*... An image of the Virgin was one day seen to sweat, till it ran down her face in streams; the portent was accounted for by the declaration of a Devil extorted from him in the process of exorcism, that at that moment she had been engaged in withholding the upraised arm of her incensed Son, and that the agitation which she underwent in Heaven had made her image thus perspire on earth.t... A Carthusian saw our Lord take from a quiver some fiery darts, which he was preparing to hurl against this world, when the Virgin interposed, and he relented at her prayer, saying he could refuse nothing that she asked. It was not a mere dream; for, after the monk awoke from his trance, the Virgin appeared to him and bade him relate what he had seen, and admonish the world to repent. Should you tell me, Sir, that these are only pious frauds, I must exclaim with St. Peter Damian, but using the words in a different sense from that in which he intended them,

* S. Anton. 3 p. Hist. Lit. xxii. c. iii. § 31. and 4 P. xv. c. ii. ib. 501.

+ Cæsarius, ib. 501,

P. Euseb. Trop. Mar. 1. iv. c. lii. ib. 502.

Lit.

*

impia pietas! They who either feign miracles, or falsify history upon that system, should put the question to themselves which our sagacious South puts for them when he says, "will not the world be induced to look upon my religion as a lie, if I allow myself to lie for my religion?" Sometimes the great goddess is represented in a vindictive character, clothed with terrors, As when Minerva in her Sire's defence,

Shook in Phlegræan fields her dreadful spear. Twelve times during the wars of the Portugueze in Angola has she been seen in battle, in the foremost ranks, sword in hand, slaughtering the infidels by hundreds and by thousands;† in one great action when two hundred Portugueze with ten thousand negro Christians were attacked by an enemy of no less than six hundred thousand unbelievers, she came, with Santiago by her side, and routed them with incredible destruction. With Santiago by her side she defended Cuzco against the Peruvian insurgents; with Santiago, won for the Spaniards the strong hold of the Peñon de Acoma in Mexico. Armed cap-a-pee in white armour,

* Vol. i. 334.

† Andrade, ut supra, 564. Andrade, 572. from the Annual Letter of the Jesuits, ib. § lb. 581, 2.