THE TORTURE BY SQUASSATION.

Nothing can exceed the hatred which Papists bear to "the truth as it is in JESUS," and to those persons who are holy and consistent followers of the religion of the WORD OF GOD. The most diabolical cruelties are practised upon them wherever Popery gains the ascendancy. We wish it to be distinctly understood that what we are about to describe is not the cruelty of heathens, but the PAPISTS' RELIGION in practice. The torture by SQUASSATION is thus per

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formed. The prisoner has his hands bound behind his back, and weights are tied to his feet; he is then drawn up on high, till his head reaches the very pulley. He is kept hanging in this manner for some time, that by the greatness of the weight hanging at his feet all his joints and limbs may be dreadfully stretched, when on a sudden he is let down with a jerk, by the slackening of the rope, but kept from coming quite to the ground, by which, terribly shaken, his arms and legs are all disjointed, whereby he is put to the most exquisite pain; the shock which he receives by the sudden stop of his fall, and the weight at his feet, stretching his whole body most intensely and cruelly. If the prisoner is condemned to be well tortured, they give him two jerks of the rope; if severely tortured, three jerks, at three different times within the hour.

Fathers and mothers, can you think of your offspring being tortured in this manner with cold-hearted indifference? Every one who assists in the spread of Popery, helps forward the perpetration of such atrocities. Remember the Popish NOTES in their Bibles, as Rev. xvii., 6-"Drunken with the blood of saints. The Protestants foolishly expound it of ROME, for that there they put heretics to death, and allow of their punishments in other countries; but their blood is not called the blood of saints, no more than the blood of thieves, mankillers, and other malefactors; for the shedding of which, by order of justice, no commonwealth shall answer."

Protestants, hearken! Your blood is as the blood of thieves, MURDERERS, and other malefactors, in the estimation of Romanists.

TORTURE.

The historian of the Spanish Inquisition, Don Juan Antonio Llorente, who had formerly been its Secretary, says :-" I shall not describe the different modes of torture employed by the Inquisition,

as it has been already done by many historians; I shall only say that none of them can be accused of exaggeration.”—(Chap. IX., p. 65.)

As an instance of the enormous cruelty of the practice, it may be mentioned that, in 1552, Marie de Bourgogne, a person of Jewish extraction, was imprisoned on suspicion of holding Jewish, in opposition to Christian, tenets. After waiting five years in vain for proof, "the Inquisitors commanded that Marie should be tortured, though she was then ninety years old, and the Council had decreed that in such cases the criminal should only be intimidated by the preparations. The inquisitor Cano says, that the moderate torture was applied; but such were the effects of this gentle application, that the unfortunate Marie ceased to live and suffer in a few days after.

"The inquisitors took advantage of some expressions which escaped from the unfortunate woman during the torture, to condemn her as a Judaic heretic, in order to confiscate her property, which was considerable. Her memory, her children, and her descendants in the male line were declared infamous, her bones and effigy were burnt, and her property confiscated.”—(Llorente, c. xviii., p. 171.)

POPERY AND PROTESTANTISM; OR, ITALY AND

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ENGLAND COMPARED.

Lord Burleigh, the celebrated Secretary of State to Queen Elizabeth, says, in his Advice to his Son, "Suffer not thy sons to pass the Alps, for they shall learn nothing there but pride, blasphemy, and atheism."-(See Von Raumer's Contributions to Modern History, 1836, letter 69, p. 440.) Two hundred years

That is, to travel into Italy.

after, Mr. Eustace, a Romish priest, who travelled into Italy in 1802, was struck with the depraved state of morals in that country. He asks, "May it not be ascribed to the corruptions of the national religion, to the facility of absolution, to the easy purchase of indulgencies ?"-(Classical Tour, vol. 3, p. 131.)

On the other hand, the Abbé Gregoire, who was Bishop of Blois in France, under the constitutional system, made these remarks to a friend, during a visit to England in the same year, 1802 :-" The thing which gives me the greatest pleasure in your institutions is, the general appearance of moral conduct that everywhere prevails; the astonishing observance of the Sabbath, the respect for religion," &c.-(Yorke's Letters from France, 1814, vol. 1, p. 173.)

Italy was then, as it has always been, the head-quarters of Popery, and England of Protestantism. Yet as one Romanist condemns Italy, so another praises England, on the ground of morality. Instead, then, of helping to Romanise England, how much better it would be to devise means for Protestantising Italy.

MARVELLOUS DIMINUTION OF THE ROMISH CLERGY IN EUROPE.

(From "L'Echo di Savonarola,” p. 239.)

In 1757 there were found in France alone not less than 300,000 priests and friars. In 1829, the number of them did not surpass that of 108,000. For many and various causes, the personel of the clergy in Europe has been greatly reduced. Referring to the list, we find that the number of the ecclesiastics, in proportion to the population, has diminished :-In Rome, in 65 years, threefourths; in Portugal, in 31 years, five-sixths; in Sicily, in 51 years, four-fifths; in Bavaria, in 28 years, little less than half; in France, in 67 years, five-fifths;* in Switzerland, in 37 years, * An evident misprint.-Ed.

a third; in England, in 133 (?) years, two-thirds; in Russia, in 33 years, two-thirds; in Denmark, in 20 years, one-half; in Sweden, in 60 years, a third. The total diminution of the Romish clergy in Europe amounts to 855,000.

These statistics will afford abundant materials for useful reflection, but we consider it best to leave them to the wisdom of our readers.

ROMANISING TENDENCIES EXPOSED.

BY AN OXFORD PROFESSOR.

The Rev. Dr. Ogilvie, Professor of Pastoral Theology at Oxford, and formerly Tutor of Balliol College, where Tractarianism has ripened most abundantly into Romanism, has lately published a volume of Sermons, in which he exposes the disingenuous nature of that system with the accuracy of an eye-witness.

"Whither can we turn our eyes without beholding the disastrous results of first overlooking, and then forgetting, the boundaries that separate truth from falsehood, right from wrong, without perceiving that uprightness and plain-dealing are on every hand yielding and giving way to equivocation, and fraudulent concealment? Who amongst us is not familiar with examples of language employed for the purpose rather of disguising than of sincerely expressing the meaning of the speaker or writer who uses it? Who has not to mourn over instances that have been presented to his view, of appeals seemingly earnest, of reasonings apparently implying a firm conviction in the minds of those who uttered them, suddenly and coolly recalled as if they had been put forth in jest, or to try experiments on the credulity and implicit obedience of eager followers? * * * Verily from ourselves, as from the people of God of old, 'judgment is turned away back

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