A GENERAL VINDICATION OF THE REMARKS ON THE CHARGE OF THE BISHOP OF DURHAM, CONTAINING A REPLY TO A LETTER FROM A CLERGYMAN OF THE DIOCESE OF DURHAM, (SECOND ED.) A REPLY TO THE OBSERVATIONS OF THE REV. THOS. LE MESURIER, RECTOR OF NEWNTON LONGEVILLE, A REPLY TO THE STRICTURES OF THE REV. G. S. FABER, VICAR OF STOCKTON UPON TEES, AND SOME OBSERVATIONS ON THE MORE FASHIONABLE METHODS OF INTERPRETING THE APOCALYPSE. Let not those (who charge the Papists to be Idolaters) lead the People by the Nose to believe they can prove their Supposition when they cannot. Thorndike, Just Weights, p. 11. VINDICATION, &c. &c. THERE are scarcely any subjects of literary investigation, which at certain periods take a stronger hold of the mind, or more readily awaken the passions, than those which are connected with religious controversy. The Remarks, which a Catholic writer lately ventured to offer on the Bishop of Durham's Charge (a Charge containing, in the opinion of unprejudiced judges, a cruel and unprovoked attack on the opinions of Catholics), appear to have alarmed and irritated the zeal of several among the watchmen of the holy city. I say of several, because I know that many members of that respectable body, the established clergy, have condemned the acrimony of the Bishop's pamphlet, and have lamented that it was ever made the subject of public discussion. Scarcely, however, had two months elapsed from the publication of the Remarks, before two reverend apologists had emptied the vials of their vengeance on the head of the writer. Their characters and pretensions seem to be of very different orders. The first that appeared in the field was a gentleman of Rabbinical descent, by name Elijah Index, whom gaiety instead of learning furnished with arms, and zeal instead of prudence urged to the contest. But his campaign was speedily terminated. Elijah, after a short struggle, found his own naïveté and ridicule so successfully retorted on himself, that he had the good sense to seek a timely and precipitate retreat. At his departure, a clergyman of the diocese of Durham volunteered as his substitute, but wisely refused to wear his uniform. Instead of naïveté and ridicule, he seized the rusty weapons of antiquated controvertists, and endeavoured to overpower his adversary with scraps and extracts from their writings. His name, indeed, he has judged it prudent to conceal: yet to aid the conjectures of his readers, he has kindly condescended to favour them with his portrait. I am," he says, "of "a heavy disposition, clumsy and awkward, and a dull "matter-of-fact enquirer."* His claim to these admirable qualifications it would ill become me to dispute. Indeed, his work appears to depose in his favour; and I have traced, with considerable satisfaction, the features of the parent in those of his offspring. One expression only I beg leave to improve, by adding, that if he be a matter-of-fact enquirer, he has seldom the good fortune to be a matter-of-fact dis coverer. 66 The matter of fact, to which the clergyman had devoted his attention, was not a subject of very difficult investigation. It required no extraordinary diligence of research, no peculiar powers of discrimination. It was merely to decide, which of the two, the Bishop of Durham, or the author of the Remarks, had delineated with greater accuracy the doctrines of the Catholic church. That their delineations are contradictory, is evident; and the consequence must be, that one of them has knowingly or ignorantly incurred the guilt of misrepresentation. The charges which the Bishop has so pointedly preferred, the Remarker has as emphatically denied: the odious doctrines which the first has with so much liberality bestowed, the other has with equal pertinacity refused. Now the presumption is, as far as I may be allowed to judge, in favour of the Remarker. It is not natural to suppose, that a Ca * Clergyman's Letter, p. 8. |