CATHOLIC ALLEGIANCE.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume I, Issue 7, 14 June 1873, Page 12

CATHOLIC ALLEGIANCE.

Loed Denbigh, some year or two ago, gave utterance to an expression which has passed into a proverb and an axiom. B[e has had the dignity of inscribing something upon the memory and upon the tongues of Englishmen by saying, "I am a Catholic first and an Englishman afterwards."

Sir George Bowyer, a Catholic, writes to the • London Times' in answer to an article on Archbishop Manning:— l deny that my loyalty and my patriotism differ in any respect from those of a Protestant. Xlie Protestant stands up for his religious liberty and his church, and FiTi' . £ ut i hiß do , ea *S' affecfc m * or m 7m 7 patriotism, for I hold that the duty of an English Roman Catholic to his Churoh and his religion cannot be inconsistent with his allegiance to his sovereign and his love of his country." Archbishop Manning said lately : "I can conceive no subject in which Catholics can be in collision with the laws of the British Empire, so long as the laws of the British Empire are not in collision with the laws of God." An American Catholic journal says:—" The only religion that is above the people and controls them is the Catholic religion. It does not defend on them for protection 5 it is their guide and protector. « But, it is often ignorantly said and believed, "no Catholic can be bound to a contract as a citizen, because he owes allegiance to the Pope ! This is just as absurd as to say. "No Christian can be a good citizen because he owes allegiance to God." The allegiance of a Catholic to the Pope binds him to be a peaceable and obedient subject to hia own State. J