and embrace those sacred and lucrative remains, at certain fixed prices. By this raree-show, the monastic orders often gained as much as the bishops did by their indulgences."* At length the Roman Pontiffs assumed the chief power over this profitable traffic, and "when the wants of the church or the demon of avarice prompted them to look out for new subsidies, published not only a universal, but a plenary remission of all the temporal pains and penalties which the church had annexed to certain transgressions." They even audaciously usurped the authority which belongs to God alone, and impiously pretended to abolish even the punishments which are reserved in a future state for the workers of iniquity, a step which the bishops, with all their avarice and presumption, had never once ventured to take.†

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It was by the sale of such indulgences that Pope Leo X. carried forward the magnificent structure of St. Peter's church at Rome. He published a system of indulgences suited to all ranks and characters of men, and promised a plenary remission to all who should contribute their money to the furtherance of this and other ambitious projects. So that the foundations of this edifice, which has been so much extolled, were laid, and its superstructure reared, by means the most impious and diabolical, by a display of reckless perfidy and insatiable avarice, and at the expense of undermining the whole fabric of Christianity, and usurping the prerogatives of the King of heaven. To such a pitch was this daring impiety carried, that indulgences were farmed out to the highest bidders, who, to make the best of their bargains, procured the ablest and most eloquent preachers to extol the efficacy, and enhance the value of such wares. A price, on a graduated scale, was set upon the remission of sins of every description, not even excepting the most horrid crimes, such as the murder of a father, mother, or wife; so that for ninety livres, or a few ducats, or even for half a guinea of English money, a pardon might be procured from the "Apostolic Chancery," for crimes which all civilized nations punish with death

* Mosheim, Cent. 12.

† Ibid.

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The raging thirst of dominions which consumed the Roman Pontiffs, prior to the Reformation, and their arrogant endeavours to oppress all that came within the reach of their power, were accompanied with the most impudent and insatiable extortion. "All the provinces of Europe were in a manner drained to enrich these ghostly tyrants, who were perpetually gaping after new accessions of wealth, in order to augment the number of their friends, and the stability of their dominions; and every stratagem was used to rob the subject without shocking the sovereign, and to levy taxes under the specious mark of religion." Such was the shameless rapacity which then prevailed, that even in that age of superstition and servility, the eyes of all ranks began to open and to perceive the vileness and impiety of the pretensions of the ecclesiastical orders. Not only private persons but also the most powerful princes and sovereign states exclaimed loudly against the despotic dominion of the Pontiffs, the fraud, avarice and injustice that prevailed in their councils, the arrogance and extortion of their legates, and the unbridled licentiousness and rapacity of the clergy and monks of all denominations, till at length the Reformation dawned and brought to light a scene of extortion and profligacy produced by the lust of covetousness, which had never before been exhibited with such effrontery in any country under heaven. In such a state of things it was no wonder that ignorance prevailed, that morality was undermined, and the peculiar doctrines of Christianity thrown into the shade and entirely overlooked. The public worship of the Deity was little more than a pompous round of external ceremonies more adapted to dazzle the eye than to enlighten the understanding or to affect the heart. The discourses of the clergy were little else than fictitious reports of miracles and prodigies, insipid fables, wretched quibbles and illiterate jargon which deceived the multitude instead of instructing them. The authority of the holy mother church, the obligation of obedience to her decisions, the virtues and merits of the saints, the dignity and glory of

Mosheim, Cent. 12.

the blessed virgin, the efficacy of relics, the adorning of churches, the endowing of monasteries, the utility of indulgences, and the burnings of purgatory, were the principal subjects on which the clergy descanted, and which employed the pens of eminent doctors of divinity, because they tended to fill the coffers of mother church, to gratify her ambition, and to advance her temporal interests.

It is impossible to ascertain, with any degree of accuracy, the vast sums of money and the immense property which for ages were extorted from the people of Christendom for such unhallowed and sacrilegious devices. But it must have amounted to many thousands of millions of pounds, the greater part of which was employed for the purposes of devastation and carnage, of luxury and debauchery, and for tyrannizing over the people, whom the clergy had reduced to poverty and ignorance, by their shameful licentiousness and unbounded rapacity. The one-fifth of the wealth thus acquired, had it been spent for the good of the church, as was impiously pretended, might have been sufficient to have diffused the knowledge of the gospel of Christ over every region of the globe, and to have evangelized every portion of the Pagan world. But, alas! it was wasted in promoting schemes directly opposed to the principles and interests of genuine Christianity, forming one striking instance, among many, of the incalculable good which has been prevented, and the numerous evils which have been entailed on the world by the indulgence of Covetousness. The Pope's present revenues as a temporal prince, have been calculated to amount to at least £1,000,000 sterling, per annum, arising chiefly from the monopoly of corn, the duties on wine and other provisions. Over and above these, vast sums are continually flowing into the Papal treasury from all the Roman Catholic countries, for dispensations, indulgences, canonizations, annats, the pallia, the investitures of bishops and archbishops, and other resources. It is computed, that the monks and regular clergy, who are absolutely at the Pope's devotion, do not amount to less than 2,000,000 of persons, dispersed through all the Roman Catholic countries to assert his

supremacy over princes, and to promote the interest of that church. The revenues of these monks do not fall short of £200,000,000 sterling, besides the casual profits arising from offerings, and the people's bounty to the church, who are taught that their salvation depends upon this kind of benevolence. In Spain alone, the number of ecclesiastics, including the parochial clergy, monks, nuns, syndics, inquisitors, &c., amounts to 188,625. The number of archbishops is eight, and of bishoprics, fortysix. The archbishop of Toledo alone has a revenue which, according to the most moderate calculation, amounts to £90,000 annually. In Portugal, in 1732, there were reckoned above 300,000 ecclesiastics out of a population of less than two millions. The Patriarch of Lisbon has an annual revenue of £30,000, and the revenue of the Patriarchal Church, above £114,000 sterling per annum. It is stated by Mr. Locke, in a Diary of his travels when on the Continent, inserted in Lord King's late biography of that illustrious philosopher, that the expense of the ecclesiastical establishment of France, at the period in which he resided in that country, amounted to above twenty-four millions of pounds sterling. What, then, must have been the immense treasures of wealth collected by the extortions of the Roman pontiffs and bishops prior to the Reformation, when the whole of the European nations lay prostrate at their feet, and were subservient to their interests,-and when the newly discovered countries in America were plundered to augment their revenues, and to gratify their unbounded rapacity! The wealth thus amassed, might have been almost sufficient to have cultivated every region, and to have transformed every portion of the globe into an earthly paradise.

Even in England, during the reign of Papal tyranny, the avarice of the clergy seems to have risen to an enormous height. Mr. Hume, in his history of the reign of Henry III. of England, gives the following description:"Every thing was become venal in the Romish tribunals; simony was openly practised; no favours, and even no justice could be obtained without a bribe; the highest bidder was sure to have the preference, without regard

either to the merits of the person or of the cause; and besides the usual perversions of rights and the decision of controversies, the Pope openly assumed an absolute and uncontrolled authority of setting aside, by the plenitude of his Apostolic power, all particular rules and all privileges of patrons, churches, and convents. On pretence of remedying these abuses, Pope Honorius, in 1226, complaining of the poverty of his see as the source of all grievances, demanded from every cathedral two of the best prebends, and from every convent two monks' portions, to be set apart as a perpetual and settled revenue of the papal crown; but all men being sensible that the revenue would continue forever, his demand was unanimously rejected. About three years after, the Pope demanded and obtained the tenth of all ecclesiastical revenues, which he levied in a very oppressive manner, requiring payment before the clergy had drawn their rents or tithes, and sending about usurers who advanced them the money at exorbitant interest. In the year 1240, Otho the legate, having in vain attempted the clergy in a body, obtained separately, by intrigues and menaces, large sums from the prelates and convents, and on his departure, is said to have carried more money out of the kingdom than he left in it. This experiment was renewed after four years with success by Martin, the nuncio, who brought from Rome powers of suspending and excommunicating all clergymen that refused to comply with his demands. Meanwhile all the chief benefices of the kingdom were bestowed on Italians; non-residence and pluralities were carried to an enormous height; Mansel, the king's chaplain, is computed to have held at once seven hundred ecclesiastical livings, and the abuses became so evident. as to be palpable to the blindness of superstition itself." "The benefices of the Italian clergy, in England, were estimated at the amount of 60,000 marks a year, a sum which exceeded the annual revenue of the Crown itself."

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Pope Innocent exacted the revenues of all vacant benefices, the twentieth of all ecclesiastical revenues without exception, the third of such as exceeded 100 marks a year, and the half of such as were possessed by non-residents.