“WHITEHALL, 6th April, 1906.
The Rev. NEIL MACINTYRE,
The Manse, Glendale, Skye.
SIR,—I am directed by the Secretary of State to inform you that he has laid before His Majesty the Resolution from the Western Presbytery of the Free Presbyterian Church of Scotland, respecting the marriage of Her Royal Highness Princess Ema of Battenberg.
I am to point out that the prohibition of Royal Marriages without the consent of the Sovereign, which is contained in the Act 12, George III., cap. 11, does not apply to ‘the issue of Princesses who have married or may hereafter marry into foreign families.’—I am, Sir, your obedient Servant,
HENRY CUNNYNGHAME.”
The point at the close of this reply has been disputed. Prince Henry of Battenberg, father of Princess Ema, though a foreigner by birth, became a naturalised Englishman, and so it is maintained that the above rule does not hold good in the present case.
Romanist Activity in the West of Scotland.—Some statistics as to the strength of the Roman Catholic Church in the Archdiocese of Glasgow, are issued by authority of Archbishop Maguire. During the past year two new Missions were opened, five new churches were opened and three are in course of erection. New chapel schools were completed at Govan Street, Glasgow, Stevenston and Whiteinch, and similar buildings are in course of erection at Carnbyne and Tollcross. Three new schools were completed at Coatbridge, North Woodside Road, Glasgow, and Govan. The priests of the Archdiocese now number 267. Of these 223 are seculars and the other 44 are regulars—i.e., members of the following Orders or Congregations:—Jesuits, Vincentians, Passionists, Franciscans and Benedictines. There are 87 Missions in the Archdiocese, with 117 churches, chapels and stations. The estimated Catholic population of the Archdiocese is about 380,000. There are 109 schools, with 152 separate departments, of which 89 schools and 128 departments are attached to Missions. There are also seven secondary education centres recognised by the local committees. The total number of children in all the schools of the Archdiocese presented at the religious examination for the past school year was 54,540, an increase of 2,835 on the number for the previous year. The total number of teachers is 1,399.—Banner of the Covenant.
The English Roman Catholics and the Education Bill.—The Lenten pastoral letter of the Roman Catholic Archbishop of Westminster, read in all the churches of the archdiocese, is in the main devoted to the proposed Government Bill on the elementary education question, and a re-statement of the Roman Catholic claim. “Simple Bible teaching, it is now suggested,”
the pastoral states, “should be imposed by statute on all the public elementary schools in the country; in other words, that it should be permanently established and endowed. In the eyes of Catholics, this would be the establishment and endowment of Protestantism in its simplest form. We have no desire to interfere with the rights of parents to have such a system of education if it satisfies them. We can have none of it.” The Catholic claim, the pastoral declares, is for a Catholic education, and that “implies three things: (a) Catholic schools, (b) Catholic teachers, (c) effective Catholic oversight of all that pertains to religious teaching and influence.”—Daily Mail.
The late Lord Acton on Ultramontanism.—The late Lord Acton was a staunch Romanist. The Roman Catholic Tablet of 11th November, 1905, p. 781, spoke thus of the most learned man in Europe:—”The fervour and the orthodoxy of this living encyclopædia of history are placed high above all reach of suspicion.” “It has never been my fortune,” Lord Acton says in a letter to the late Mr. Gladstone, “to meet with an esoteric Ultramontane—I mean, putting aside the ignorant mass, and those who are incapable of reasoning, that I do not know of a religious and educated Catholic who really believes that the See of Rome is a safe guide to salvation. . . . . In short, I do not believe there are Catholics who, sincerely and intelligently, believe that Rome is right and that Dollinger is wrong. And, therefore, I think you are too hard on Ultramontanes, or too gentle with Ultramontanism. You say, for instance, that it promotes untruthfulness. I don’t think that is fair. It not only promotes, it inculcates, distinct mendacity and deceitfulness. IN CERTAIN CASES IT IS MADE A DUTY TO LIE. But those who teach this doctrine do not become habitual liars in other things.”