Current Topics AT SOME AND ABROAD,

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XIII, Issue 34, 18 December 1885, Page 1

Current Topics AT SOME AND ABROAD,

In relation to the disgraceful exhibition that has Evangelical now been going on in the Colony for some weeks' diversion, and which at present occupies the evangelical bullring or cock-pit at Wellington, it is hardly necessary for us to remind our readers that they see only the regularly recurring diversion of the Evangelical world. We allnde to the tirades against the Catholic people made by the woman who calls herself O'Gorman or Auffray, and whose norn de theatre, on boxing-ring title, is the " Escaped Nun." Concerning the woman herself we do not consider it necessary to say much. The rery nature of her occupation is sufficient to explain her character to all Catholics, and it is for Catholics that we write. Certain American papers, moreover, and notable among them the New York Sun, a secular newspaper, have given an account of her career which was reproduced in our columns a month or two ago, and this must have confirmed all that Catholics had previously concluded, if any confirmation were necessary to them. We are not, again, without some feeling of compassion for a poor creature earning her living in such a way. We think it very possible— and,more, almost probable.that she still retains some remnants of the Faith-and, believing with the belief of devils, finds herself in some degree in the position of those miserable beings whe in the ancient world were represented as driven by the furies. Can our readers conceive the frame of mind of a human being looking forward with certain eyes to eternal torment and determined at least to bring a full score before the Judgment Seat where the terrible sentence will be passed. To carry such a mind must in itself be punishment beyond all imagination, and, however great the wickedness of the situation, it is not without the reach of pity. We would leave this woman, then, to her God Who will require an account of every word she speaks. Nor are we troubled about this matter on the part of the Catholic community. To suffer persecution is a note of the Catholic Church, and, in one shape or another, such suffering must pursue her members. The penal days are over, and, for the time at least, they cannot return. But the hatred still exists in which the penal days themselves originated, and it must have some form and method of expression. Is it not a full and bitter persecution that foul and ribald accusations should be publicly brought amid the applause of a mob against respectable and inoffensive people? Our holy religion, however, is worth the penalty -we pay for adherence to it, and it would be so were that penalty fifty times, nay, fifty thousand times as great. Our fathers in by-gone days bore the imputation of all this infamy, and in addition they were fined or imprisoned or banished, or put to torture or death, and how shall we complain? Our God requires such sacrifices of us, and had warned us that He would require them. What, therefore, is there for us to Bhow but patience and submission ? And it is not now, moreover, as it was in earlier days ; we do cot now find the higher class of Protestants arrayed on the side of the vile defamer. The matter has gone down into the lower ranks, and is the particular privilege of coarse and vulgar people. Respectable men aud prominent members of the Anglican Church, indeed, in years passed by were deceived by some foul apostates who came to them with their tale of lies and filth. They took up such men as Aehilli or Ciocci— but they burned their fingers badly and their experience, as well as the advancement in refinement, and the return to more Catholic practices, of the Church of England made them wiser and of better minds. They will, indeed, still support apostates from the Church, but these people must now keep themselves within bounds, and there is no opening for prurience or abomination on their part. Loyeon, for example, declaims no tale of infamy against Catholicism, nor does Savarese or Campello. But as to the effects of these brutal exhibitions on Catholicism we honestly believe— and we speak from some personal knowledge and experience, that they are wholesome,— and we believe, and we have particular reasons for our belief , that even towards the Protestant world itself they are beneficial. They excite the cariosity of minds that had never thought of the Church, and lead to inquiry that must tend towards conversion.— They

may even ultimately benefit the peopl* wbom they prejudice the most, when some chance or accident reveals to them the probability that they were misled, and <• further acquaintance sought with Catholics, their habits and thei. 1 religion, results in completely disabusing them. — Nothing materially or lastingly injurious to the Catholic cause, in fact, has ever followed from such exhibitions — and that is acknowledged by somr of the chief opponents of the Church themselves.— Take, for example, this passage from the late Canon Kingsley.— " For the time we rink for calling Popery ill names is past : to abstain is certainly a sore restraint for English spirits. . . But Romanism has been exposed, and refuted triumphantly, every month for centuries, and yet the Romish nations are not converted ; and too many English families of late have found, by sad experience that such arguments as are in vogue are powerless to dissuade the young from rushing headlong into the very superstitions which they have been taught from infancy to deride. The truth is, Protestantism may well cry ' Save me from my friends V We have attacked Rome too often on shallow grounds, and finding our arguments weak have found it neceaaary to overstate them. We have got angry and caught up the first weapon which came to hand, and have only cut our own fingers. We have very nearly burnt the Church of England over our heads, in our hurry to make a bonfire of the Pope. We have been too proud to make' ourselves acquainted with the very tenets which we exposed, and have made a merit of reading no Popish booka but such as we were sure would give us a handle for attack, and rot even then without the precaution of getting into a safe passion be. forehand. We have dealt in exaggerations, in special pleadings, in vile and reckless imputations of motive, in suppressions of all palliating facts. We have outraged the common feelings of humanity by remaining blind to the virtues of noble and holy- men, because they were Papists, as if a good deed was not good in Italy, as well as in England. We have talked as if Sod had doomed to hopeless vilenessin this world, and reprobation in the next, millions of Chris" tian people, simply because they were born of Romish, and not of Protestant fathers. And we have our reward ; we have fared like the old woman who would not tell the children what a well was, for fear they should fall into one. We see educated and pious Englishmen joining the Romish communion simply from ignorance of Rome, and have no talisman wherewith to disenchant them. Our medicines produce no effect on them, and all we can do is, like quacks to increase the dose. Of course if ten boxes of Morrison's pills have killed a man, it only proves that he ought to have taken twelve of them. We are jesting, but as an Ulster Orangeman would say, "I 1 is in good Protestant earnest.' " — (Miscellanies, Vol I. p.p. 235-6) Canon Kingsley, as we all know, and as, indeed, he himself in this same review tells us, was a Protestant among Protestants— but he had recognised the falsehood and folly of such infamous onslanghts on the Catholic Church. — We venture to differ from him as to his confidence that legitimate controversy would be more effectual in hindering conversions, but it would at least be manly, and fair, and decent. — Kingsley's warning may possibly also have contributed to unveiling the more brutal method for Englishmen of the higher class, and aided in the revolt of the more cultured mind against it . — The lower Protestan ism, however, runs itself in so coarse and ugly a groove that nothing need surprise us as to the associations in which we find it. — When we are told, as we are for instance*by a report in our contemporary, the Evening Press, that a band of Evangelical ministers were the patrons of this unhappy woman at Wellington) we perceive that they were quite in their proper place. — Even the Evangelicalism of the Church of England has been recognised by members of that Church as inconsistent with the character of the gentleman, and what are we to expect of those bodies in which evangelicalism reacheß its extreme ? What especially of the ministers who necessarily display an exaggeration of the general tone of their flocks ? We have, however, no desire to be unjust, and, no matter what we may be obliged for truth's sake to withhold from our ministers, we are willing to concede to them all that is tbeir due. We do not, then, see, according to our contemporary's report, that there was a disgusting affectation of kindly feeling, and their usual revolting hypocrisy, among them on the occasion to which we allude. They did not on this occasion make any pretence to serve their " dear brethren of the Romish Church," as they are wont to call us, or, while spitting filth in. our faces, affect to caress ue, On the contrary, so far as we can judge, they were quite

openly brutal, and did not disguise their real intention of hounding us into the gutter, or starving us out if possible. One of these good fellows, the man named Isitt, for example, upbraided Messrs. Stout and Ballance because, said he, " they were purchasing their present positions by bidding for the Roman Catholic votes through the mean 8 of the appointment of Roman Catholics to places under Government to the exclusion of other denominations." There is the whole persecuting spirit expressed, and proof positive of the virulent and disgraceful hatred by which these men are actuated. Here is a man who declares himself, not the advocate of the spiritual interests of Catholics, bat the opponent of their temporal interests ; not the opponent of the Catholic system— but the determined personal enemy of those who practise it. This unfortunate woman is evidently ran upon the platform not only to give an occasion for the indulgence of that grossness and prurience ever rampant among the lower sects— who, nevertheless, need some excuse sufficient t in their own eyes for the public enjoyment of such a banquet — but for the purpose of making the position of Catholics in [the Colony unendurable, and driving them out or injuring them in every way possible. We do not think any decent or fair-minded person, or any one who desires to preserve the order, peace, and tranquility of the Colony will blame us for stigmatising such conduct as ruffianism, pure and simple. We \rould recommend this poor woman, then, to the charitable consideration of our readers. Her conduct is very bad, very wicked, but it carries its own punishment with it. We do not, moreover, know her circumstances : a woman who has made a false step finds it often impossible to retract, and the more desperately she proceeds the greater reason we have to believe that she may not be under her own unrestricted control. It used to be the old song that a woman's fortune was in her face, but we now see, in more than one instance, that, reversing all our notions concerning the female world, it exists in her tongue— and run upon the termagant's platform, she becomes a profitable investment. We will only hope, and every Catholic must hope that the grace of repentance sooner or later lies before this poor woman— O'Gorman or Auffray. The gravity of such exhibitions, meantime, does not consist in the fall and perversion of any poor creature, although, God knows, there is cause enough for sorrow in that. It lies in the Evangelical demand for abomination that affords a temptation to the degraded to supply it. It lies in the demoralisation which it proves to exist, and which such indulgences increase among the lower Protestant and infidel people. It lies in the brutalising influence exercised over the community generally, and the proof given that all the boasted enlightenment, liberality, and civilisation of the times contain their hollow and most rotten parts, and that a great portion of religious-seeming mankind is still at heart devoured by rancour and uacleanness. In the present case, especially it lies, moreover, in the unblushing effrontery with which men pre tending to be Christian ministers have come forward in the insulted name of religion to incite Protestants and Freethinkers against their Catholic fellow colonists tempoially. and to deprive these Catholics, if possible, of their means of living, and reduce them to want and misery— for this, we say again, is what the candid Isitt, with the consent of his colleagues, has done. This favourite and regularly recurring diversion of the Evangelical world, then, is not without its more tragic elements.

AN EVANGELICAI ALARM.

Oub Evangelical friends, it seems, have quite given up all their hopes of the conversion of Ireland. We sympathise deeply with them in their affliction because of the waste involved of soup, and tracts and " open Bibles," and all the other instruments wherewith the Evangelical missionary wooes the adhesion of the ungodly. Catholics in Ireland, notwithstanding all that has been done, have continued to go to bed Catholics and to rise in the morning unconverted. Those among them who came down to breakfast with their faces shining as if they had been well stubbed with soap, in proof of a Pauline change, have been wanting and all the other marks of an unction proceeding from a fervent imagination, or a hypocrital pretence, are absent as well. Is it to be wondered at that our Evangelical friends are vexed in their righteous souls ? Immense sums of money obtained from the credulous for the purpose of bringing Irish Papists into the paths of light have been spent on the support of parsons, and scripture-readers, and teachers of one kind or another, but all in vain. Still these good people have been supported, and the labourer is worthy of his hire even if he be employed to make a fool or something worse of himself, and to try to do as much mischief as possible. Did >... not preach, and read, and declaim, and verbally send the I'm , „, peidition many times a day and every-day, not even omitting Sundays. And all this we know is hungry work] and requires for its maintenance that the hac sent round should be well filled. There is nothing, then, after all to regret in the matter, great many very capacious stomachs have been satisfied and as to the aouls of the Papists, they are probably none the worse. Evangelicalism exhibited in its true light is always a wholesome sight for them, and a very effectual warning. Some intelligeat Briton, however, baa been making a torn in Ireland, and he has communicated

the results of his observations in the shape of a letter to that religious newspaper the Chiardian, and hence the lamentations of our Evangelical friends. Tney are thus informed, it seems, that Ireland 8 wholly taken up with politics and that religion no longer has a place there. The people are leaving Popery, but, alas, they display no desire whatever to enter the Evangelical field instead. An in. attention to the admonitions of Father Pat, in fact, by no means involves a longing for edification at the hands of Stiggins or Chadband, and there are more ways than one that lead to the devilThe Irish people according to this correspondent have found one of those other ways. We would not, however, have our Evangelical friends made too uneasy as to the religious condition[of Ireland. It does not follow that because Irishmen have not shown themselves ready to " discoorse" religion with every passing stranger, or because they may appear more careless in the eyes of superficial observers and those who have no right to their confidence, that they are in the least likely to prove wanting to their Faith. Politics no doubt engross at present almost all their minds that are given to worldly things, and that amongst any people U necessarily a very large portion. The proofs furnished, moreover, in contradiction of all the prejudices obtaining with regard to the bigotry of the Irish Catholics in their choice of national representatives, and in which they have shown themelves liberal-minded in the highest degree -.Mr. Pyne forexample.one of the chosen candidates, and now no doubt a member of Parliament, is an English Protestant, the son of a Lite iector of an English parish Dr. Tanner is also a Protestant, and, so, not to speak of Parnell and Justin McCarthy and his son, are others of them, these proofs may have led people not acquainted with ihe charactar of liibh Catholics to conclude that some change hal come over their minds with regard to religion. But the Irish people were never bigoted ; they never disliked a man because of his religion and that only, and they were always ready to place their confidence m honest Protestants, and to prefer them to Catholics whom they kne.v that tiiey could not trust. There is no reason, therefore, for alarm on tbe pare of our Evangelical friends ; their worthy missionaries will not be put to shame, and it will certainly be known all in good time that where Stiggins and Chadband made their failure infidelity did not succeed. We do not suppose our Evangelical friends know what they are talking about when they compare the irreligion which they assume to be setting in among Irishmen to that prevailing on the Continent of Europe, and which they attribute to disgust caused by the priests. We can hardly lay it to the charge of our Evangelical friends that they never open their mouth, as the old saying is, without putting their foot in it. If they kept their mouth shut, we should know nothing as to their condition. — Silence, although all sorts of people from the Catholic saint to the rationalist writer of fiction, from St, Francis of Sales to George Eliot, have warned us against taking it as a necessary mark of wisdom, is still a fair method of concealing ignorance. Our Evangelical friends, however, will by no means consent to make use of itthey will open their mouth, and they never do so without fallowing us to see its complete emptiness. We do not suppose that they have even the remotest suspicion that the irreligion prevailing in Catholic countries on the Continent had its origin in English infidelity and atheism. Voltaire who introduced unbelief among the Latin races was the pupil of English infidelity, and he hardly improved upon what he had learned from his masters. The great Protestant country moreover of the Continent, that is Germany, is far more infidel than France herself, and the religious condition of Berlin is more deplor" able than that of Paris, But of this our Evangelical friends most probably know nothing. What, then, becomes of their argument that fidelity is caused by disgust at the Catholic priests ? The arguments of the know-notbings, however are scarcely worth repeating. It is something, nevertheless, to find that evangelicalism throws up the sponge where Ireland is concerned and acknowledges its long, violent? and unseemly, struggle in that country to have been entirely fruitless. Let us be thankful for small mercies, particularly when they come from small people, who naturally have nothing more than the widow's mite to give us.

DISTINGUISHED ENCOURAGES! EXI

One of the most remarkable articles which have appeared for some time is that published by Car- , dinal Manning in the -Dublin Review for October respecting the part to be taken by Catholics in the recent elections. Hl3 Eminence, who has always been known as a true friend to the Irish people, shows how fully he sympathises with them in their patriotic aspirations, and ascribes to the best feelings of human nature the origin of that disaffection entertained by them towards the English Government. He alludes to the important part that Irish settlers have had, and still have, in the Catholic affairs of England, and points out the consideration due to them, The Cardinal has seen with much, satisfaction the extension of the franchise— which has been the great event of the times— and he recognises it as a step back in the right direction towards the days of the good King Edward and the Saxon times, when the people took so full a part in the government of the country His Eminence approves of democratic institutions, but regulated and moderated by

the monarchical form of government, which he prefers to the repub. lican, and he considers that the hereditary succession to the throne is the means of preventing much confusion and many abuses. It is, however, touching the religious and educational questions of the day that he is most concerned. He admits that England, although no longer Catholic, remains profoundly Christian— giving an admirable sketch of the religious vicissitudes of the Established Church from the time when, in the second half ot the last century, indifference and unbelief had reached their climax among her peop c. We know, indeed, that at the time when Wesley began his reform the Church of England was hardly any longer more than Christian in name. The life of utter worldliness was that which, for the most part, prevailed even among her ministry, and open infidelity and profligacy were not unfrequent among them. Wesley's revival, although it had its extravagant features, and eventually separated from the Church and branched off into a number of sects, was atill a genuine Christian revival for the Establishment itself, and religion in England undoubtedly owes no small debt to it. The Cardinal also alludes to the Oxford movement, and to the hopes that may be based upon the growth of a more Catholic knowledge among the community alluded to. He mentions as a proof of Christian life the immense sums expended daring the last forty years on the restoration of churches, a great work by which the piety of the past has been brought before the eyes of the present and future, and he concludes that it is not for Catholics now to do that which had been done by Cranmer, Ridley, and Knox, and to take any part in the destruction of religion. The Cardinal, also, in proof of the Christian, though, alas, not the Catholic spirit of England alludes to the great sums spent on schools where a religious education has been given, and it is especially in defence of these schools that he addresses his readers. The test which he proposed for the trial of every candidate before the votes of Catholics were given to him was as to whether he would.or would not, oppo-e the secularisation of education. We are, moreover, particularly interested in this portion of his Eminence's argument because it concides so exactly with the recommendations that we ourselves have so often given to the Catholics of this colony. — We see by a cablegram received this week that the Pope has written to Cardinal Manning approving of the voluntary Catholic schools as supported in these colonies. We do not, of course, know the particulars of the case, but if it turns out as it apparently may do, that his Holiness has pointed to the efforts made by Catholics here to give their children a Christian education as a model for the Catholics in England, who are now fearing that they also may be made the victims of secularism, we shall have something of which we may well be proud, and we shall have something more than even the sanction of the Holy Father to encourage our perseverance. — Cardinal Manning, then, approves of our educational policy and recommends its adoption by the Catholics of England and the Pope commends our efforts for the preservation of our children 'B faith.

A PROMISE OP VICTOBT.

Thk return of Mr. Parnell to Parliament at the head of a compact and devoted body of 86 ia a triumph of Irish union and determination. The great parties in the House of Commons are not, as it seemed as if they would beat the beginning of the elections, evenly balanced. The Liberals have a larga majority, and, strange to say, they owe their strength in great part to the country districts— their failure in the towns being probably due in a great measure to the opposition of tbe Irish voters, But to what their success in agricultural parts is due we cannot as yet tell. Has there been smouldering in the heart of Hodge an enmity against the squire and the parson 1 Does he desire the downfall of the Established Church, or has he a longing for a share in his landlord's acres ? To all this as yet we receive no answer, but time will doubtless explain all as it really exists. The Liberal party, however, is very much divided, and the differences between its various 'sections may go far to weaken the majority which it commands numerically. At any rate, Mr. Paraell, who did so much in a hostile House with a small troop of followers, will surely b« able to make the most of his vastly increased strength in a House that we believe will prove more friendly. The Irish question, meantime, is evidently gaining ground in many places, and even in quarters that were at one time noted for their opposition to the cause, a disposition is now shown to deal fairly with it. Nor need we Iqok upon this as a mere patient acceptance of the inevitable, and a determination to make a virtue of necessity. The rights of the case have been forced upon the attention, of the world, and they are too plain when once fairly considered to admit of any continued misunderstanding concerning them. Our contemporary the Dunedin Evening Star, for example, now admits that the concession of a Bystem of self-government to Irelaud, similar to those enjoyed by the greater colonies, is no more than a reasonable proposal, and such as all English statesmen should agree to. He qualifies his admission, indeed, by warning Mr. Parnell that all English parties would unite againßt an attempt to extort anything m»re. But ai Mr. Parnell 'b demands would be fully satisfied by euch a concession, the

warning is hardly necessary. A Parliament dealing with Irish matters as colonial Parliaments deal with colonial affairs is all that Ireland asks for, or could reasonably ask for. It is, moreover, all that she has a right to, for no country can claim the right to injure a great empire— involving also her own irremediable and fatal injury — and any attempt at secession might lawfully be met as the Northern States met that made by the Southern confederacy in the great civil war. No one can be more ready to recognise this than Irishmen themselves who took so large a part in repressing the rebellion. It would also be recognised by the inhabitants of the Southern States who for the most part now perceive the folly of their outbreak and are grateful for its wanfc'of success. That there are fanatics who would be satisfied with nothing but a total separation from England we do not deny— but .these are men for whose opinions no one of commoa sense has any [regard, and they would gain no more attention in an Irish Parliament than has been accorded by the House of Commons, for instance, to Mr. Bradlaugh. Granted justice, and there is no reason why Ireland should desire separation from the British Empire. Two reasons alone could be produced for such a step, and neither of them is worthy of consideration. The one is a sentimental reason with regard to the glories of ancient times — the other a reason of revenge for evil days gone by. Both, however, will be repudiated by all rational people, who take a practical view of things, and will not be permitted to influence the ordinary affairs of life. Mr. Parnell goes with 85 colleagues into the House of Commons to demand only what is rational and just, and worthy of a man as moderate as he is patient, persevering, and able. It is well that a disposition is shown to meet his demands in an accommodating and friendly way — and we have no doubt whatever as to the result.

SIGNIFICANI KETUENS.

Whatever else the results of the Irish elections have proved, they have shown beyond all controversy the falsehood, of the very last plea urged, against the concession of Home Rule. — There is in some eyes a vision of the stalwart bands of a united province marching to attack the Parliament House in Dublin, and strewing all their way with the corpses or maimed bodies of vanquished Papisti. No one sees any prisoners dragged along in the rear of the conquering army, for even their worst enemies will not dare to accuse the Ulster Orangemen of the possibility of giving quarter. They may have bowels of mercy ; there maj be some one towards whom they are capable of exercising forbearance, but Papists are without exception excluded, and nothing would remain for them but death either immediate or by lingering tertuie on the field of glory— for their conqueror*. There may be a question, indeed, as to the wisdom with which the enemies of the Pope and the devoted admirers of the Orange heroes oppose the concession of Home Rule, for regarding it as certain, as they do, that in any conflict between Protestants and Papists the former must be sure to obtain the victory, they should more consistently advocate a step that must at once deliver over the objects of thair hatred into the hands of the destroyer. An Orange march on Dublin attended by the unsparing and complete slaughter of Papists is the very thing that should command their hearty approval, and the concession of Home Eule contains the promise of it for them, and, in this manner, an easy settlement of the whole question. King Billy redivious would settle the whole concern, and what would be the good of his worshippers if they could not galvanise some successoi to him? The picture of United Ulster sending forth nothing but Orangemen, and drawing the sword to aveDge the insult offered and the injury threatened, vanishes now, once and for ever, into thin air. Ulster is not united ; Ulster is not entirely Orange. It is divided in sentiment and divided a good deal towards the wrong side. The desire for Home Rule has obtained a very considerable holding there, and Mr. Parnell's authority is owned laigely throughout the province. Fifteen Parnellites, at least, have been returned for Ulster constituencies, and that must be acknowledged to be a very respectable number, or a very disgraceful one, on the other hand, according as opinions differ. There are thirty-three constituencies in the province, and, since only eighteen Members have been returned for the whole country, who do not belong to the national party — if we assume that in no other part of Ireland was a 6eat gained by any one who was not a Parnellite — our conclusion is evident, and there are at least fifteen Ulster Parnellites in the new Parliament. But if any constituency outside of Ulster was false to the national cause, the case is still worse, or better, as it may be, and the Ulster contingent is necessarily larger. The threat of civil war then becomes in the face of all this a very feeble one — and an Orange riot or two would be about all that would be likely to occur in the way of hostilities.— As Orange riots, however, are certain to occur in any case, no one need allow his mind to be much troubled about that. People who want to fight and will fight may as well be permitted to fight from one cause as another. They will not handle their sticks or their revolvers one bit more deftly owing to the nature of the aggravation given them — although, no doubt, their anger will be greater in proportion

«w the benefit to the country which provokes them is greater The significance, meantime, of the national victory in the North is very important, and we may even take it, perhaps, as a token that the Orangemen themselves are not unanimous in a determination to injure their own interests in those of their country, however they may otherwise adhere to their senseless and disreputable commemorations, and outrageous principles. The Pamellite candidates returned had possibly many Orange supporters.

COMICAL F BE E DOM

What was the original creed of the Eev. Shirley Baker 1 Was he not himself a Methodist or something akin there-to and what has happened to him that he Bh °ul<i grow free in his beliefs and become the patriarch of a new communion—a free Church, whose freedom nevertheless, is of that particular kind not hitherto altogether un^ known among the sects ? The Eev. Shirley Baker, it seems, and bis principal subject the King have established a Free Church at Tonga whose particular freedom appears to be of that remarkable kind of which we have also a striking instance in the State Church of Russia. All good subjects are expected to partake of its freedom and if they do not chose to do so, woe betide them. Let us acknowledge, nevertheless, that those who do not choose to be free deserve to be slaves and, therefore, that the Eev. Shirley Baker and his King are not wholly withont reasons for their action. Persecution, it seems, is in full swing at Tonga, and all who refuse to embrace the freedom offered to them are incontinently visited with heavy penalties. Two young girls, for example, as we are told, who persisted in wearing the shackles of Wesleyanism were transported in a boat to a desert island, or to within a few hundred yards of such an island, and there they were desired to jamp out into the surf and make their way as best they might on shore. The life of Robinson Crusoe, however not to speak of a ducking, did not seem an attractive one to these distressed damsels, and they escaped the martyr's fate by embracing the heresy proposed to them. They are now existing in a state of freedom, and let us hope they may enjoy such happiness as the renegade can know. What, meantime, are the particular heresies proposed to all these people on pain of banishment to uninhabited parts-which in that part of the world probably mean rocks and reefs, and other impossible places of residence ? Is Christianity compromised? Are any of the great truths, of those " essentials " whereof our Evangelical friends make so much repudiated ? Is the infallibility of the " unaided Word" called in questioner every man's right to a share in that infallibility denied ? Do the members of the Free Church claim, in contradiction of the Arminianism of the Wesleyans, that a man cannot possibly fall from grace, in which case, moreover, we see an additional reason as to why the new Church should be called free. What change of doctrine, in fact, was required of those two young ladies who determined on embracing anything rather than confide themselves to the tender mercies of the surf, and to what weight are their consciences now submitted ? There are some curious points about this matter that we would gladly see explained. Persecution in this Nineteenth Century of one Evangelical sect by another-even a new one, seems contrary to all that we are accustomed to hear. And again we ask as to Mr. Shirley Baker, what was his former creed ? Was he not a godly man, a missionary himself, a student of the •< Open Bible," and' a partaker in its intallibxhty ? How then has he adopted the character of the persecutor, and arrived at inflicting penalties on all who will not become members of the new Church? Or, if he has so greatly fallen from grace, what assurance id there that the •• unaided Word " will preserve other men, even missionaries, from an equal fall, or that it will not justify them to themselves in persecuting, banishing an d conducting to gymnastics in the surf, or elsewhere, all who refuse to follow their Bp.ritunl kad ? 3 his persecution at Tonga, then, is rather instructive, and we may possibly be excused, if apart from any real suffering on the part of the persecute 1, we find it also somewhat ridiculous.