British Influence in Spain.—We have received a copy of El Progreso, a Spanish newspaper, containing an informing article on British influence in Spain. According to the writer, any hopes that the Spanish marriage engendered for a progressive and liberalising policy in National affairs have been dashed to the ground. “(Roman) Catholic re-action has broken out afresh in a surprising manner. The party that trades upon the name, but only the name, of Liberal, has turned more Ultramontane than the Conservative, its chiefs make noisy displays of (Roman) Catholicism, help Maura efficiently in his work of barbarous retrogression, and carefully prepare new steps backward, to be in readiness for the time when they shall return to the sweets of power. Then you may picture (Roman) Catholic and inquisitional revivals to persecute even to annihilation the little liberty still remaining.”—Banner of Truth, July, 1909.
King’s Protestant Declaration.—“I have been asked,” says Mr. Walter Walsh, “by a Scottish clergyman—a reader of the English Churchman—to give very briefly the history of the King’s Protestant Declaration. It originated in the reign of that disguised Romanist, Charles II., through whose secret influence, aided by the Jesuits, the Church of Rome gained immense political power in England. In 1673 the country became alarmed by what was taking place, with the result that in that year an Act of Parliament was passed (30 Charles II., Statute 2) which required every Member of Parliament, both in the House of Lords and in the House of Commons, and also the holders of public offices, to repeat aloud, swear to, and sign the document now known as the King’s Protestant Declaration. But at that time the Sovereign was not required to take it. This Declaration was taken by all Members of Parliament down to the passing of the Roman Catholic Emancipation Act of 1829, by which Act the law on the subject was repealed, and a new Oath was substituted in its place. This new Oath was repealed in 1871 by the 9 and 10 Victoria, chapter 59. On the accession to the throne of William and Mary in 1689, by what is known as the ‘Bill of Rights,’ it was enacted that ‘every King and Queen of this realm, who at any time hereafter shall come to and succeed in the Imperial Crown of this Kingdom, shall, on the first day of the meeting of the first Parliament next after his or her coming to the Crown, sitting in his or her throne in the House of Peers, in the presence of the Lords and Commons therein assembled, or at his or her Coronation, before such person or persons who shall administer the Coronation Oath to him or her, at the time of his or her taking the said Oath (which shall first happen), make, subscribe, and audibly repeat the Declaration mentioned in the Statute made in the thirtieth year of the reign of King Charles II., entitled “An Act for the more effectual preserving the King’s Person and Government, by disabling Papists from sitting in either House of Parliament.” The Declaration referred to is, of course, the King’s Protestant Declaration. That portion of the ‘Bill of Rights’ I have just quoted is still the unrepealed law of the land. Long may it continue so!”