(Continued from page 404.)
DR. ROBERTSON, in his fourth chapter, shows that the Roman Church is “bankrupt in France and in other continental nations.” As our readers know, France has recently passed laws that have effectually broken the power of the so-called Church within her borders, and have driven a vast number of Romish ecclesiastics out of the country. The Law of Associations was passed in 1901, and required all associations to register themselves, and to give an account of their real estate and incomes, “under pain of dissolution.” Many Orders of the Roman Catholic Church were engaged in commerce—“manufacturing wine and spirits, perfumes, medicines, and soap”—and the new law had the effect of suppressing these Orders, as well as of closing “monastic and nunnery schools.” The monks and nuns refused to submit to the Law. Again, the Law of the Separation of Church and State came into operation in 1906. The reign of Popery in France was thus brought to an end. And Dr. Robertson maintains that “people in general in France are not drifting into infidelity or atheism, just as they are not doing so in Italy, although the Papal Church declares such is the case in both countries.” There are signs of a movement towards Protestant Churches. He then passes on to notice Austria, which used to bear the title, “Most Catholic,” and proves from various facts and statistics that Protestant Christianity is gaining many converts there, and that not less than three-fourths of the people “are out of sympathy with Rome.” From Austria he proceeds to “Catholic Germany,” and shows that there is active revolt in that quarter among Romanists against the authority and influence of their Church. Then he briefly notices Spain, Portugal, and Belgium, and finds a similar state of matters obtaining. In Spain only five millions out of twenty-five millions of professed Papists “ever go to Confession.” It is rather remarkable to learn that in all these Roman Catholic countries, as sadly contrasted with Protestant Britain, “the monasteries and nunneries have all been placed under State supervision and control,” and are open to regular Government inspection. Surely our legislators are dreadfully deluded and bewitched when they refuse to pass a law of a similar kind. No wonder that the Romish hordes are fleeing from the continent to these islands of ours, and availing themselves of the too great freedom which prevails among us. They, indeed, are taking advantage of a freedom which they themselves explicitly condemn in their creed, and which, in like circumstances of power, they never grant to any other. Let it be noted, however, that the freedom of a false charity is only a subtle form of bondage. The man is in bondage to sin who deliberately allows the criminal to pursue his nefarious task without check, and that when he has perfect power to stop him. And it is because iniquity is beginning to abound in the heart of Great Britain that she does not discern the evil of Popery as she once did, but gives it free entrance within her borders.
In an interesting fifth chapter, entitled “English Gold to fill Empty Coffers,” Dr. Robertson makes it very plain that “an insatiable gold-hunger” has been one of the ruling passions of the Roman Church, and that the present inrush to our country is nothing less than a demand for money by fair means or foul. The Pope is losing his Peter’s Pence in other countries, and under the pretence of a consuming desire for the welfare of the souls of English and Scottish people, he is determined to convert their money to his own pockets. The circumstance is suggestive that his agents carry on their work, to a very large extent, among the richer classes. It appears that there is a good field for this in England. “There are, at the present time, some forty Roman Catholic peers in the House of Lords. These men, for the most part, are not only unfit to sit in the British Legislature, but unfit to hold property in the kingdom at all; for their purses and estates, as well as their votes, are controlled wholly by their Jesuit Confessors in the interests of their mundane Church, the enemy of England. . . . Besides the peers, there are some fifty or sixty Roman Catholic baronets and knights, all of whom are wealthy, and not a few of whom are in the House of Commons, and whose wealth is to a large extent at the command of the Church.” A practical example of the unhallowed greed of the Papal Church has appeared in connection with the Old Age Pensions. An Irish writer to the Protestant Observer states that “under the care of a community of nuns there is a home for old ladies in the north side of the city of Dublin. Most of the inmates, on entering, carried with them some money, which they handed to the sisters. Now, the old ladies have received Old Age Pensions, and the decree has gone forth that four shillings of each pension are to pass into the community coffer, and one shilling is to be retained by the pensioner.” Dr. Robertson also points out that “the true explanation of Irish emigration” is not the supposed despotic rule of Great Britain, but the never-ending tyranny and greed of the priests. Is it not also an alarming fact that the value of the gross estate of the Roman Catholic Church in Great Britain and Ireland is not less than one hundred million pounds? This is a very large nest egg, and she has every hope that she will be able to multiply it indefinitely. Like the monster she is, Rome wants Britain’s life and purse. No wonder Dr. Robertson concludes this chapter with the words: “A brigand Church is at your pockets! Wake up, John Bull!”
The next four chapters deal with the Popish Army of Invasion in this country, and are packed with information as to the proceedings and methods of the priests, monks, and nuns who have come to stay among us. He shows very vividly and powerfully the wily plan of campaign that is pursued, and attended with so much success. Then there follow three very instructive and telling chapters, which deal in a most convincing manner with the baneful influence of the Church of Rome, as promoting Intellectual, Moral, and Family Deterioration. These pages are illustrated with two striking cartoons. One is headed “The School of the Priests,” and the picture is given of a priest teacher, with fierce countenance, inoculating a little crying boy, laid on his knee, with poison from several bottles he has beside him. The second cartoon is far and away the most graphic and terribly suggestive picture of the kind our eyes have ever happened to rest upon, while it is at the same time an exact and unexaggerated representation of truth. Its title is “The Snares of the Confessional,” and it exhibits the priest in the form of a tremendous spider that has got a little family of husband, wife, and two children into his far-reaching web. The spider, with the priest’s head and face, has laid hold of the mother, who is nearest him, with his long arms, and she, though in a frenzy of alarm, seems helpless in his grasp. Still she holds fast, with one hand, the children, who are clasping each other on her right side, while the father, who is on the outside of all, has his grasp on the little ones, and seems to be attempting to rescue them, but is apparently dragged along also. The picture is altogether one that expresses a volume of meaning, and will not easily be forgot by anyone who has seen it. Dr. Robertson gives various practical examples in present-day life of the efforts which priests and nuns make to get hold of Protestant families.
His thirteenth chapter, on “Hoodwinking British Travellers in Rome,” supplies a vivid account of the tactics adopted at the chief seat to get British Protestant people to visit the Pope at the Vatican. Every art is employed to accomplish this end, and it is melancholy to think how successful these wiles are. Everything possible is done to break down really Protestant feeling, and the Pope is delighted to welcome Protestants, and to send them away charmed with his genial manners. Personally we give very little for the Protestantism of people who would pay any such homage to the representative of “the man of sin,” but the evil is very near our doors, when not long ago two daughters of an Edinburgh United Free Church minister paid him a visit, and brought home the pleasant report that they were not merely inclined to kiss the Pope’s ring, but to kiss himself. “He was charming,” they said. “The carnal mind” is evidently the same in the Protestant as in the Papist, and is in love with Popery in its essence, root and branch. What is lamentable, however, is that this “mind” is getting full play now-a-days in surroundings where better things might be expected, and that it is only a very thin partition that seems to stand between many nominal Protestants and the Church of Rome.
Dr. Robertson, in his fourteenth chapter, deals at length with “The Eucharistic Procession Device.” He points out that “religious processions are pagan in their origin,” and that the Roman Church is only more pagan in these performances than the ancient heathen. Addressing England, he says: “The Eucharistic Congress held in your capital, and its procession—like the huge fabric of the Cathedral with which they were associated—have a very ominous, a very sinister, a very menacing look. They all form part of a deeply-laid Papal plot for your subjugation. They all say as plainly as language can: ‘See what a power we Roman Catholics have become in England. Already we can treat with the State on equal terms. Already we can say to England’s Prime Minister, “We count on your protection for our procession.” Already we can invoke the secular arm in aid of our projects. But we do not mean to rest here. For just as we have built our Cathedral tower proudly to overlook the Houses of Parliament, Buckingham Palace, and half of London, so our hope is that one day we will dominate State, Throne, and People.'”
A very important and informative chapter is the fifteenth, headed “Capturing the English Press.” It is quite apparent to any who have been watching the press of this country for years back, that great deference is shown by newspaper editors to the Roman Catholic Church. The popular thing seems to be—much charity to Romanism and very little to those who strongly condemn its fallacies. The leading papers of Scotland and England are almost alike in this matter. Decidedly Protestant news and letters find a cold reception and small space, while Roman Catholic events and opinions are extensively reported. This state of matters is very alarming for the future. Dr. Robertson takes notice of the manner in which reviewers of books—not a few of whom are Papists—show little mercy to Protestant writers, and sometimes advance erroneous opinions about the superiority of the Roman Catholic Church. He gives a quotation from a Romish reviewer, who maintained that “the adoration of the Virgin Mary” helped greatly to raise the status of women, and to increase the respect in which they are held in modern as compared with ancient times. Dr. Robertson answers this ignorant idea very pungently and effectively. He recalls the fact that “the Council of Trent only decided by a majority of three that women have souls,” and he then adds: “At the present day in every Roman Catholic country, women are considered by the Roman Catholic clergy and by the clericali amongst laymen, as little more than animals, formed for man’s service and pleasure. As long as the Church was in power in Italy, women were left completely uneducated. . . . Then, nothing could be more erroneous than the reviewer’s statements about the effect of ‘the Catholic adoration of the Virgin Mary’ in instilling reverence for women and a ‘knightly ideal of womanhood’ in the minds of men. . . . A Judge of the Supreme Court in Venice told me that Mariolatry is the influence that first leads many young men into a life of vice. And I believe that all in Italy who have to do with the criminal classes could confirm the statement. Amongst Roman Catholics Mary is simply Venus, the goddess of material love. It is a curious and significant thing that the worship of the Virgin does not find the same favour among sisterhoods and women in general. A feminine jealousy prevents it. But amongst priests and monks and bigoted laymen, she is their all-in-all.” Our author also calls attention to the facts that many novels are written now-a-days with a view to glorify the Roman Church, and that “text-books used in schools—especially text-books of history,” are written under Roman Catholic influence, and contain statements designed to damage the Protestant cause and advance the Roman. He concludes by noticing present-day attempts by the Romanists in England “to muzzle free speech and free writing altogether.” The persecution of the Rev. George Wise, Liverpool, whose case has been so much before the law-courts, is mentioned as one of the illustrations.
Dr. Robertson, in his sixteenth chapter, devotes special attention to “The Roman Catholic Disabilities (Removal) Bill,” and from a very full statement of facts, leads up to the conclusion, that the ultimate end aimed at by the promoters of this Bill, is “the bringing in of a Roman Catholic Sovereign.” He carefully points out, as has already been done in these pages, that if the changes proposed in the King’s Declaration be carried out, “then the Declaration could be made by any sovereign, Protestant or Papal, and so the way would be cleared for the placing of a Roman Catholic upon the throne;” and for consequent evils which he enumerates—“for the stamping out of our civil and religious liberties; for the re-introduction of Bishops’ Courts and prisons, so ardently desired; for the setting up, in fact, of the Inquisition, and for the re-lighting of the fires of Smithfield.” He takes note of the fact, that many of those who are in favour of this Bill, passionately assert that they have no design upon the throne, or the Protestant Succession, but over against their averments, he sets a number of weighty considerations, one of which runs in part as follows: “Many, if not all, of those who are taking a leading part in promoting this Bill in Parliament, and in advocating its claims before the public, are members of such societies as The White Rose League, The Royalist League, The Legitimist Jacobite League, The Forget-me-not Royalist Club, and similar societies, everyone of which exists for the very purpose of ousting our Protestant Hanoverian Dynasty, and of reinstating the Papal Stuart line, in the person of a foreign princess, whom they speak of as Queen Mary III.” Some people will hardly believe that societies with such an object exist, but Dr. Robertson is a careful writer, whose statements may be relied upon. The very names of the societies mentioned, suggest the great object that is at heart.
Perhaps the most startling chapter in the whole book is the seventeenth, the subject of which is “The Military Invasion.” Dr. Robertson distinctly anticipates, from the various signs of the nations and the times, that an attempt will be made in the not too distant future to send a foreign army into our country—an attempt which will be in the interest of the restoration of the temporal power to the Pope. He gives a pretty large quotation from even a prominent Roman Catholic, who complains in strong and vigorous terms that “the Pope and his advisers have never hesitated to urge on war, no matter how bloody, when the slightest of their ordinary worldly purposes could be served by it,” and that as “they did everything they could to stir up the war between Austria and Prussia in 1866,” and the war between France and Prussia in 1870, so “now they are doing all they can to arouse hatred, even to deluge Italy in blood in the vain attempt to recover its temporal power.” Still further, Dr. Robertson mentions that in 1874, Cardinal Manning said: “There is only one solution of the difficulty—a solution, I fear impending, and that is, the terrible scourge of continental war. . . . And it is my firm conviction that in spite of all obstacles, the Vicar of Jesus Christ will be put again in His own rightful place. But that day will not be until his adversaries will have crushed each other with mutual destruction.” Dr. Robertson considers that the Emperor of Germany is the man who is likely to plunge our nation into war, and that, among other things, he possesses “these two qualifications for the task—hatred of England and love of the Pope.” He goes further and says that “it has been long known in Italy that the original date fixed upon by the Pope and the Kaiser for the carrying out of their nefarious enterprise was 1911-1912,” but that as England is partially awakening to the danger, the date may now be deferred to a more distant time. Truly this chapter is worthy of the most careful study and reflection on the part of our legislators and people. The Pope with the blood-red sword of war is standing at our door! “It is high time to awake out of sleep.”
Dr. Robertson’s last chapter is “Measures of Defence and Reform.” The measures he proposes are not so much political and material, as religious and spiritual. He sees that we have material blemishes and backslidings. One of these is “an excessive devotion to sport,” which the Roman Church encourages. Another and more outstanding is “the depreciation and neglect of the Bible.” He observes that Great Britain is losing its hold of God’s Word, and the closing passages of his book consist of an eloquent, earnest, and evangelical appeal to the people of his native country “to hold firmly, and guard faithfully, their glorious heritage of Christian Protestantism.” He declares in sound gospel terms, that “it is only in the natural soil of the unrenewed heart that Roman Catholicism can ever take root; that no Christian, no one who has been regenerated, redeemed, born again, could ever be induced to enter” its fold, and that “therefore only those who are unconverted, who are still in the grip and power of Satan, will ever be found entering Satan’s Church.” He pleads with preachers, scholars, teachers, parents, to adhere closely to the “glorious Gospel of the blessed God” in its simplicity and purity, and to make the young familiar with the Holy Scriptures from their earliest years. “I would plead with my countrymen everywhere, to reinstate the Bible in its old place of sovereignty in their homes and in their hearts.” He also recommends parents to teach their children what He well describes as “that most marvellous compendium of Christian doctrine—The Shorter Catechism.”
We cannot conclude our review of this timely and valuable book, without again expressing the hope that its publication may be blessed to the enlightenment of many, and may be the means, in the Lord’s hand, of checking the ascendancy in Great Britain of that woeful enemy, “whose coming is after the working of Satan, with all power and signs and lying wonders, and with all deceivableness of unrighteousness in them that perish.” We are very pleased to learn that by the kindness of friends of the Protestant cause, a copy has been sent to every member of the new Parliament.
The Railway Companies and Sabbath Traffic.
—At the annual meetings of the directors and shareholders of the Scottish Railway Companies the question came up at two of the meetings. The spokesmen of the directors cannot be said to have given anything like satisfactory answers to the questions put to them. They did not hide the damaging fact that increased dividends was a factor in the situation that appealed to them. It was encouraging to observe that Mr. Whitelaw uttered a strong protest against increased Sabbath travelling as a money-making concern. We could have wished that he had gone further and condemned the use of Sabbath trains altogether, which he did not, justifying them on the plea of necessity and mercy.