THE following pithy letter by Mr. Primmer appeared in a recent issue of the Northern Ensign:—
SIR,—There is in your last issue an extraordinary letter above the signature of “H. Henderson.” For ignorance and effrontery it will be difficult to match it. He refers as his authority to Cobbett’s so-called “History of the Reformation.” Wm. Cobbett wrote this book under the direction of the Jesuits, and that for money. He offered to write a refutation of the same if the Protestants would pay him for it. From it your correspondent says he learns that the Popish is a united and powerful church. He will find that the unity is that of the churchyard. No Papist is allowed to think contrary to his Church or to exercise private judgment. As for power, she maintains it by keeping her dupes in ignorance and by bitter intolerance. It is untrue that she introduced Christianity into this country; but it is true she sought to suppress the religion of the Bible and in its stead to set up superstition and idolatry. It is utterly false that the Popish Church “works for the welfare of the country.” Look at Ireland, enslaved by her, and the whole population fleeing to America to escape her bondage, as Michael M’Carthy has so ably shown.
Your correspondent also says that worse things than Popery can be taught in schools. I defy him to prove that. Why, France and Italy have cast the priests, monks, and nuns out of their schools, as they are rebels to the State. What can be worse than to teach superstition, idolatry, and blasphemy? Mr. Henderson is ignorant of the fact that the Pope authorised Henry VIII. to suppress large numbers of the monasteries and nunneries, but has banished the Jesuits, monks, and nuns from French soil. The same thing was done thirty years ago in Italy. He says Rome is about to conquer this country and regain ascendancy. Will she? Ere long there will be enacted in this country what France has been compelled to do. If France in the name of freedom has had to grip Popery by the throat and overthrow her and trample on her as the implacable foe of the nation, Great Britain before long will be compelled to follow her example. As for hunting after property, none can ever come within a hundred miles of Popish agents in robbing the living and the dying, and especially the dying, of all they possess, and leaving the dependent wives and children to starve.
And then as to sects and divisions, is he ignorant of the existence of endless sects and divisions in the Church of Rome? There are the Jesuits, Dominicans, Franciscans, etc., who all fight against each other. Why, there have been two Popes and even three Popes reigning at the same time, warring, cursing, and sending each other to perdition. He concludes by calling Rome, which set up the bloody Inquisition and slaughtered the followers of Christ by the hundred thousand, as “motherly and charitable.” Yes, and so is the blood-thirsty wolf. Rome will tolerate no Protestant to live when she can put him to death.—I am, etc.,
JACOB PRIMMER.
The Manse, Kingscarthie, Dunfermline,
3rd Nov., 1904.