tious Papist. It may be so. The more conscientiously devoted to his Church any Papist is, the more hostile he must be to a Protestant Establishment. But who can say, that a Papist, who conforms to a Protestant Church, does it not from conscientious motives? Conformity to the laws of our country is at least an act of civil virtue, which entitles the conformist to the privileges of the Constitution. And it is a virtue, which the conscientious recusant (however numerous his other virtues) has not. But if for want of this conformity he is excluded from such privileges, the exclusion is his own voluntary act. It is said too, that the time may come, when the disabilities may be removed; a change of circumstances may render them unnecessary. This seeems to be all delusion. What change of circumstances can render them unnecessary? I know but one; the removal of their cause,-subjection to a foreign jurisdiction. Let the persons, who think themselves aggrieved, renounce this jurisdiction; and become conformists to the Protestant Constitution of the empire; and their disabilities will cease of course. There will then be no need of an act of Parliament for their relief. Till such change takes place, the excluding statutes can never be unneces sary; and whenever it shall take place, they will cease to be a grievance. But why may not Papists be admitted into Parliament, as well as Dissenters? For a very plain reason: the admission of the latter does not militate against the essential principles of a Protestant Constitution. These essential principles are abjuration of the Pope's supremacy, and exclusion of Papists from political power. If indeed we are prepared to abandon our Protestant Constitution; if it has been found not to have answered its professed purpose; not to have secured to us the blessings of civil and religious liberty; then we may have no scruple in exchanging our present Constitution for another. But we may venture to assert that there is not one of the Protestant supporters of the Popish Claims, who would not think the ascendency of Popery a great evil.. And as the reign of Popery can never return, while the Papists are excluded from political power, what should induce us to make so hazardous an experiment, as to place such an instrument in their hands, who are bound by the strongest ties of conscience to exert every faculty of mind and body for the restoration of Popery? APOSTOLICAL ORIGIN, INDEPENDENCE, AND PROTESTANTISM, OF THE ANCIENT BRITISH CHURCH. FIRST EPOCH OF THE CHURCH. Events. 1. THE Gospel preached in Britain in the earliest times. 2. Preached in Britain before the defeat of Boadicea, A.D. 61. 3. Preached among the Celtick nations, (of which Britain was one) by the Apostles. 4. Preached in Britain by some of the Apostles. II. 5. Preached in Spain by St. Paul. 6. Preached in the Western parts by St. Paul, APOSTOLICAL ORIGIN, INDEPENDENCE, AND PROTESTANTISM, OF THE ANCIENT BRITISH CHURCH. FIRST EPOCH OF THE CHURCH. Authorities. 1. TERTULLIAN, Origen, Athanasius, Chrysostom, Arnobius. 2. Gildas. 3. Irenæus. 4. Eusebius, Theodoret, Nicephorus. 5. Athanasius, Cyril, Epiphanius, Jerome, Chrysostom, Theodoret, Gregorius, M. 6. Jerome. EVENTS. 7. Preached in the extremity of the West by St. Paul. 8. Britain included in the West, and the boundary of the Gospel to the West. 9. Preached in the islands that lie in the ocean by St. Paul. 10. Preached in Britain by St. Paul. CONFIRMATION OF III. 1. St. Paul sent to Rome in the second of Nero. (A.D. 56.) year 2. Pomponia Græcina, and Claudia Rufina, two British Ladies, at Rome at that time. S. Pomponia Græcina accused of foreign superstition. (A.D. 57.) 4. Caractacus's family sent to Rome, (A. D. 51.) |