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it by the same general motives of credibility, which con vinced the great St. Austin, and kept him within the pale of the Catholic Church. When both the Manicheans and the Donatists would attempt to reform the Church of Christ, St. Austin took up his pen against them. He would have nothing less than the most incontestable evidence of the failure of the Church. The Manicheans laboured with all their might to make him again their proselyte. But to satisfy them, that he had embraced the Catholic faith, and continued in it upon solid grounds, he wrote thus to them: "Not to speak of that wisdom, which you do not believe is in the Catholic Church, there are many other things, which most justly keep me in her communion. 1st. The agreement of people and nations holds me. 2ndly. Authority, begun with miracles, nourished with hope, increased with charity, confirmed by antiquity, holds me. 3rdly. A suc cession of Bishops, descending from the SEE OF ST. PETER, to whom Christ after his resurrection committed his flock, to the present episcopacy, holds me. 4thly. and lastly, The very name of Catholic, holds me; of which this church alone has, not without good reason, so kept the possession, that though all heretics desire to be called Catholics, yet if a stranger asks them, where Catholics meet, none of the heretics dare point out his own house or his own church. These then, so many and such sacred ties of the Christian name, justly keep a man stedfast in believing the Catholic Church. But there is nothing of all this amongst you to invite or hold me. You promise truth indeed, and make a great noise with it: and if you can make it appear with such an incontestable evidence, that no man can doubt of it: all the motives that hold me in the Catholic Church, must yield to it." Epist. contra Fund. c. 4.

Behold now, my good sir, the motives which attached St. Austin to the church. He looked upon them to be so strong, so evident, and so convincing, that he declared it to be a piece of the most insolent madness not to yield to them. So that, if the Scriptures had not been written; if Christ had made no promise of Infallibility to his Church, no one but a madman could refuse to believe her, preferably to any authority upon earth.

Thus it is manifest, that our faith runs not round the pretended circle; because all divine faith is resolved wholly and solely into the supreme authority of God Himself; and every branch of it is grounded on no other proper and essential motive, than because God has revealed it.

But since the same truths may be believed upon several motives, if the word believe signifies no more than an assent of the judgment, convinced by any theological proof, then that is true, which Mr. Lesley and you say, " that we believe the Scriptures, because the Church bids us, and we believe the Church because the Scriptures bid us.." This we repeat is very true indeed, because the inspiration of the Scriptures is legally proved from the authority of the church; and the Infallibility of the Church is as legally proved from the Scriptures. But this is so far from what is called running round in a vicious circle, or proving a thing by itself, that it is a way of arguing not only allowed of among philosophers and divines, but absolutely necessary in all cases, when two things prove each other reciprocally; as when an effect is proved from its cause, and the

cause reciprocally from its effect. The same happens when two persons of undoubted credit give testimony for each other.

We shall content ourselves with giving an instance of the latter. For example, St. John the Baptist is proved to have been a prophet from the testimony of Christ; and Christ is proved to be the Messias from the testimony of St. John. No Christian can reject these proofs as legal, and why then may not the Scriptures be proved from the testimony of the church, and the church reciprocally from the testimony of Scriptures. Both proofs indeed are circular: and therefore, as the former must be unquestionably admitted, the latter cannot be excepted against. We have now filled up our space; adieu until next week.-I remain, yours, &c. THE EDITOR.

Manchester, March 30th, 1850.

POETRY.

FOR EASTER SUNDAY.

What strain from on high wakes the bosom's devotion,
And soothes every heart-rending sorrow to rest,
And thrills through the soul with a tender emotion,
And wakes each fine feeling that dwells in the breast.
'Tis the hymn of the seraph, the anthem of praise,
That floats on the gale from the regions of bliss,
And never could angels their harmony raise
On a day more transporting and joyous than this.
The Saviour of man-once the victim of sorrows-
Now smiles on the mis'ry that darken'd his doom,
And the glory that circles his Majesty's honours,
Now brightens the horrors that hung o'er his tomb.
He rises the conqueror of death and of hell;
The spirits of darkness depart at the sight;
And thus has his rising destroyed the dark spell,
And illumined the soul with a heavenly light.

Ye angels rejoice in the full tide of praise,

Ye cherubs receive him in transports of joy. Let the song of his justice and mercy loud raise Your harps and your timbrels for ever employ.

Lo! nature exults at the rise of her King.

Each hill and each valley his praises resound;
Let the Jew and the Gentile in canticles sing,
And angels in ecstacy echo the sound.

Rejoice, then, O man, tune the soft strains of pleasure,
Let the raptures that fill you in harmony speak,
And soon may our Saviour, our hope and our treasure,
The gloom of affliction and misery break.

In the hour when the cross was the scene of his woe,
Nature grieved at his sorrow, yet man did not save,
And thus by his rising he left here below

The terrors of death and the gloom of the grave.

Let us, then, on this day the sweet anthem raise,
At the triumph which opened Heaven's portals to man,
A triumph which closed in a bright glorious blaze,
A life which in misery and sorrow began.

And oh, as we pour forth our transports of bliss,
May angels record them in th' archives of love!
That Christ, with a rising as glorious as this,
May crown us with joy in the realms above.

AGENTS.

Manchester-Mr. A. Heywood, Oldham-street.
Ashton-under-Lyne-Mr. Kerrison.
Bolton-Mr. James Mather, Derby-street.
Bury-Mr. R. Bates, 33, Pretty Wood.
Droylsden-Mr. Heath.

Stalybridge-Mr. Ridle; Mr. Harrop.
Stockport-Mr. J. Burns, Edgeley.

Printed and Published by EDWARD STAVELEY, Bedford-street, Hulme, in the borough of Manchester.-Saturday, March 30th, 1850.

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MANCHESTER ILLUMINATOR,

No. 17, Vol. I.

AND GENERAL CATHOLIC RECORD.

THE DREADFUL

SATURDAY, APRIL 6, 1850.

PUNISHMENT OF APOSTACY.

THE FORTY MARTYRS OF SEBASTE.

A.D. 320.

These holy martyrs suffered at Sebaste, in the Lesser Armenia, under the emperor Licinius, in 320. They were of different countries, but enrolled in the same troop; all in the flower of their age, comely, brave, and robust, and were become considerable for their services. St. Gregory of Nyssa, and Procopius say, they were of the thundering legion, so famous under Marcus Aurelius for the miraculous rain and victory obtained by their prayers. This was the twelfth legion, and then quartered in Armenia. Lysias was duke or general of the forces, and Agricola, the governor of the province. The latter having signified to the army the orders of the emperor Licinius, for all to sacrifice, these forty went boldly up to him, and said they were Christians, and that no torments should make them ever abandon their holy religion. The judge first endeavoured to gain them by mild usage; as by representing to them the dishonour that would attend their refusal to do what was required, and by making them large promises of preferment and high favour with the emperor in case of compliance. Finding these methods of gentleness ineffectual, he had recourse to threats, and these the most terrifying, if they continued disobedient to the emperor's order, but all in vain. To his promises they answered, that he could give them nothing equal to what he would deprive them of; and to his threats, that his power only extended over their bodies, which they had learned to despise when their souls were at stake. The governor finding them all resolute, caused them to be torn with whips, and their sides to be rent with iron hooks. After which they were loaded with chains, and committed to jail. After some days, Lysias, their general, coming from Cæsarea to Sebaste, they were re-examined, and no less generously rejected the large promises made them than they despised the torments they were threatened with. The governor, highly offended at their courage, and that liberty of speech with which they accosted him, devised an extraordinary kind of death, which being slow and severe, he hoped would shake their constancy. The cold în Armenia is very sharp, especially in March, and towards

PRICE ONE PENNY

the end of winter, when the wind is north, as it then was; it being also at that time a severe frost. Under the walls of the town stood a pond, which was frozen so hard that it would bear walking upon with safety. The judge ordered the saints to be exposed quite naked on the ice. And in order to tempt them the more powerfully to renounce their faith, a warm-bath was prepared at a small distance from the frozen pond, for any of this company to go to, who were disposed to purchase their temporal ease and safety on that condition. The martyrs, on hearing their sentence, ran joyfully to the place, and without waiting to be stripped, undressed themselves, encouraging one another in the same manner as is usual among soldiers in military expeditions attended with hardships and dangers, saying, that one bad night would purchase them a happy eternity. They also made this their joint prayer, "Lord, we are forty who are engaged in this combat; grant that we may be forty crowned, and that not one be wanting to this sacred number."

(To be continued in our next.)

TRUTH.

ST. POLYCARP, BISHOP OF SMYRNA, M.

A.D. 166.

(Continued from our last.)

In the sixth year of Marcus Aurelius and Lucius Verus, Statius Quadratus being proconsul of Asia, a violent persecution broke out in that country, in which the faithful gave heroic proofs of their courage and love of God, to the astonishment of the infidels. When they were torn to pieces with scourges, till their very bowels were laid bare, amidst the moans and tears of the spectators, who were moved with pity at the sight of their torments, not one of them gave so much as a single groan; so little regard had they for their own flesh in the cause of God. No kinds of torture, no inventions of cruelty were forborne to force them to a conformity to the pagan worship of the times. Germanicus, who had been brought to Smyrna, with eleven or twelve other Christians, signalized himself above the rest, and animated the most timorous to suffer. The proconsul in the amphitheatre called upon him with tenderness, entreating him to have some regard for his youth, and to value at least his life; but he, with a holy impatience, provoked the beasts to devour him, to leave this

captivity by the hyle, and of the manner also in which it is freed from its bondage.

wicked world. One Quintus, a Phrygian, who had presented himself to the judge, yielded at the sight of the Manes acknowledged the Paraclete, or perfecter of the beast let out upon him, and sacrificed. The authors of these acts justly condemn the presumption of those who true religion that had been promised by Christ. The oboffered themselves to suffer, and say that the martyrdomject of his mission was partly to purify that which had been of St. Polycarp was conformable to the gospel, because he exposed not himself to the temptation, but waited till the persecutors laid hands on him, as Christ our Lord taught us by his own example. The same venerable authors observe, that the martyrs by their patience and constancy demonstrated to all men, that, whilst their bodies were tormented, they were in spirit estranged from the flesh, and already in heaven; or rather that our Lord was pre. sent with them and assisted them; for the fire of the barbarous executioners seemed as if it had been a cooling refreshment to them.

(To be continued in our next.)

FALSEHOOD.

MANICHEISM.

(Concluded from our last.)

The Manichees admitted a doctrine which in form approached near to the Christian faith of the Trinity. According to their belief, the Father dwells in high, impenetrable light; his son, Christ, reigns in power in the sun, and in wisdom in the moon; and the Holy Ghost dwells in the air which encompasses the earth. From his abode there he produces his fructifying effects upon the earth, that the Jesus patibilis may liberate the substances of light which are confined in trees and plants, and which agonize in their struggles for liberty. The Redeemer imagined by the Manichees, is the Christ who resides in the sun and moon, the pure soul of light uncorrupted by matter, the son of the first man. Under his guidance, and by his means, the process of the purification of the imprisoned souls advances. From his abode in the sun, he sought to draw to himself all the elements of light that were scattered through the world those that were con fined in the lower organic and unorganic nature, strove in unconscious agitation; and those that were enclosed in human bodies endeavoured in ardent desire to gain their freedom. But this desire existed only in those men to whom was known their high origin of light. To infuse into them this knowledge, the son of eternal light descended from his throne in the sun to this lower earth. But he was not born as man: he, the Redeemer, could not be confined within a human body; he was surrounded by body only of appearance: the divinity in him was not united to the humanity; and on one occasion, in his manifestation on the mountain, he displayed his true bodiless nature of light. His office was that of a teacher: he taught the souls of men, how, by violence, they were to liberate themselves from the bonds of matter, that thus they might fly up again to the heavenly land of their origin. His passion and death on the cross were no more than a delusion, as had been his whole life on the earth. They served, however, as symbolical representations of the manner in which the soul of light is bound and held in

before revealed, from error, and again to establish it in its primitive form. After the Paraclete, no other teacher sent by God should appear. He rejected Judaism as the work of the Archon, who had manifested himself to Moses and the Prophets, but had instructed them only in error; consequently, there can be in the Old Testament no prophecies regarding the Redeemer. The Manicheans confessed that the New Testament had contained Divine revelations; but as their system could not, even by a forced interpretation, be made to harmonize with its contents, they contended that in some parts it had been interpolated, and in others falsified, by Judaizing Chris

tians.

As all those who professed the doctrines of Manes could rot or would not subject themselves to all that was required of them, the sect was divided into the classes of the hearers and of the elect. The hearers were permitted to live in matrimony, to eat flesh (but not to slay animals), to possess wealth, to practise agriculture and commerce, and to bear magistraeies. The elect, or the perfect, who were exclusively the priests, avoided every distracting connexion with the world and its goods: they led a life of Manichean purity, as far as it was possible without perishing from hunger, unmarried, without labour or possessions, free from all occupation of the senses, with the exception of music, employed only in the purification of their nature of light; and as they could not, without sin, cut or collect the vegetables that were necessary for their sustenance, they were abundantly supplied with them by the hearers, to whom they imparted in return pardon of the sins that had been committed in plucking and preparing the fruits. These elect were venerated as beings of a nature more sublime than other men; they conferred their blessing by the imposition of hands; they were employed not only in purifying their own souls, but also in liberating those that were enclosed within plants and fruits; for by eating fruits and plants, they collected these souls within themselves, and by their own continency and purity secured to them a return to the realms of light. At their death, their souls were raised, without a further delay upon the earth, to the sun, and thence to the kingdom of light: the souls of the hearers, on the contrary, not being yet ripe for this exaltation, were doomed to enter first into the soul of an elect, or to pass into a plant or a tree.

The Manichees had an external worship for the hearers, and another, internal, for the elect: the former consisted of prayer, and reading the epistle of their founder. They boasted that their worship, of God was without temples, altars, sacrifices, incense, and statues, free from all Pagan and Jewish pomp: they considered the Catholics as no more than half Christians, as they had admitted of Heathen and Jewish abuses. The religious actions and usages of the elect were hidden in the deepest secresy; and well might they thus be concealed, for if the crimes there perpetrated had met the public eye, they would have called down the severest punishments of the civil power..

Whether a baptism were administered to those who entered the class of an elect, or whether it were conferred in oil, as Turibius, bishop of Astorga, asserts, is uncertain; this, however, we know, that the Manichees despised the Christian baptism of water as of no value. To the sun and the moon, or to the Christ reigning in these luminaries, they offered Divine honours. They began the Monday with fasting. Their most solemn festival was celebrated in March, in honour of the martyrdom of their founder; it was called Berna, the festival of the seat of doctrine. In the centre of their place of assembly stood a richly ornamented throne, which was approached by five steps. These represented the five degrees of the Manichean hierarchy the twelve masters, with their chief; the seventy-two bishops; the priests, the deacons, and the body of the elect. Upon the throne itself, no one dared to sit, as a sign that no one had yet been, and never should be, found worthy to fill the place of their first and greatest teacher, Manes.

The Manichees spread themselves, with wonderful rapidity, during the third century, through the Roman empire, in places where Gnosticism had prepared a path before them; but in 296, Diocletian published a most severe edict against them. As they were a dangerous sect, originating in Persia which was hostile to him, he feared that they might introduce into his empire the abominable practices of their native land. He, therefore, condemned their chiefs to suffer death by fire, the members of the sect to be decapitated. The more wealthy were deprived of their goods, and doomed to labour in the mines.

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The worthy priest, who was somewhat advanced in years, and of a very amiable, and almost apostolical appearance, stood up in joyful surprise from his writing-desk, when he saw the lady walk in, leading the little girl by the hand. Madam von Linden told him how she had just then for the first time come to know the child, and desired her to leave the room for a little time, as she had some particular business to speak of with the priest.

"Dear father," said she, when the child was gone, "I am thinking of bringing this child home with me, and of taking the place of a mother to her. My own children all died in their tender years; and my heart tells me that I could bestow on this child the love which I had for them. But I wished to know beforehand, whether you, who knew the parents as well as the child, more intimately, will advise me to do so? What do you say? I should wish to mark my brief and fleeting career upon earth with some work of benevolence. Do you think that the charity I should shew this child would be well bestowed ?"

The pious man raised up to heaven his eyes sparkling with tears of joy, and his hands clasped in prayer. "God's holy providence be for ever praised!" he said. "A greater work of mercy you could not well perform; and a more

pious, virtuous, and intelligent child, you could not easily find than little Sophia. Both her parents were the best people in the world- truly pious, and sincerely Christian. On her, their only child, they bestowed an excellent education. Alas, that they could not finish it! Oh! I shall never forget the distress of the dying mother, as she looked upon this darling child, who stood weeping and sobbing beside the death-bed; and the trustful look which she cast up to heaven, and prayed, 'Father, in heaven, thou wilt be a father also here below, and raise up another mother for my orphan daughter! I am confident of this, and I die in peace.' And now these words of the pious mother are accomplished; for it is evident that the Almighty has chosen you, noble and venerated lady, to be a second mother to this child. It was for this you were summoned to the capital; for this, God inspired you to visit His temple once again before your departure. It is manifestly His work, His holy providence be praised and adored:!"

The good priest then called in the poor little orphan and said to her "See, Sophia, this pious inestimable lady will henceforth be a mother to you. This is an extraordinary blessing that our good God bestows on you. Will you go with her, and be a dutiful daughter to her?"

Sophia joyfully answered, "Yes," and burst into tears of joy. She could not say another word for weeping. She could but thank the lady by her looks, and kiss her hand in silence.

"See, my child," continued the parish priest, "how God watches over you! While your mother lay on her death-bed, He had, already, before we knew anything of it, brought this, your second mother, here; He did not permit her to leave this, till she had found you out, and adopted you for her daughter. Acknowledge, therein, His tender paternal care! Love with your whole heart your dear, good, merciful God, who takes you so visibly into his care: trust in Him, and keep His commandmentɛ. Prove yourself to this gracious lady-the new mother whom God has given you the same good, dutiful child you were to the mother you have lost. Thus will the kind lady find in you a source of joy; and thus will you yourself be happy. Above all, bear this in mind, your future life will not be without its troubles and afflictions, but fail not to pray then to God with the same confidence with which you just now prayed in our church, and He will never fail to be your true helper, even as He has been your helper now."

The relatives of the girl were now called. hey made not the slightest objection to the lady's adopting the poor orphan. On the contrary, they were delighted at it, and perfectly content with all that had been done. They were still more pleased and gratified when Madam von Linden declared that she would take her just as she was, and give up the little property of the deceased, and the rest of Sophia's dresses, to them and their children. Sophia only asked for a few pious books of her mother's, as a memorial, which were willingly given up to her.

Early next morning, Madam von Linden took Sophia away with her, in her travelling carriage, and returned.to her castle.

(To be continued.).

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The Divine Maternity of the B.V. Mary clearly proved from Scripture, Tradition, and the Testimony of the Anglican Church.

VII.

to dissent from the Church, and to take up with some new fangled opinions, if it be so,' says he, let it be so no more; let not novelty make such inroads upon antiquity, or dare insult it at the rate it does.' This, then, was the blessed sentence of the blessed Celestine; not that antiquity should be remiss and moderate in crushing novelty, but that novelty should not presume to make head against antiquity. And whoever breaks in upon these Apostolic, Catholic decrees, must trample upon the memory of Holy Celestine, whose decree it is, 'THAT NOVELTY SHOULD FORBEAR BREAKING IN UPON ANTIQUITY.' And in the next place he must make a jest of Holy Xystus, whose judgment it is, that 'THERE IS NOTHING LEFT FOR NOVELTY TO DO, BECAUSE NOTHING NEW IS TO BE ADDED TO THE ANCIENT FAITH.' We must reject likewise the

To-day we conclude our quotations from the writings of St. Vincent: it is true that we have been rather tedious, but no apology will be required by those who value the eloquent and orthodox writings of this illustrious Father of the fifth century, and who are feelingly alive to the necessity of putting down Nestorianism in the nineteenth eentury, received as it has been by the Protestant Refor-authority of the blessed Cyril, who highly commends the mation Society of Manchester and Salford. The Saint continues:

"I have passed my censure likewise upon Nestorius for that abominable presumption of his, in giving out, That he was the first and only man, that ever rightly understood the Sacred Scriptures; that all had been under a cloud, and not one Divine, of what degree soever, had touched upon the true sense, until he arose and made the discovery. That is to say, all the bishops, all the confessors and martyrs, those who expounded the word of God, and those who Believed such expositions, were all miserably mistaken; and lastly, for asserting that the universal church did now, as it had always done, and always would do, follow as he thought, a parcel of ignorant and erroneous teachers." (Chapter ii.)

zeal of the Reverend Capreolus, for standing up in defence of the ancient Articles of Faith, and for condemning new ones. With the like contempt also, he must tread under foot the Decrees of the Ephesine Council, that is, of almost all the Holy Bishops of the Oriential Church; who, by the Divine assistance thought good to ordain, that posterity is to hold nothing as an article of Faith, but what antiquity, sacred and self-agreeing in Jesus Christ, has held forth as such in the writings of all the Holy Fathers; and who have declared likewise, with one mouth, with one general acclamation, that it was the voice, the wish and judgment of the whole Council, that as almost all heretics, before Nestorius, for their contempt of the old doctrines, and for setting up new, have been universally condemned; so the like Anathema ought to pass against Nestorius, as a broacher of Novelty, and an enemy to all Christian Antiquity.

"Whoever then, is offended at this sacred unanimity of the Fathers in Council, at this divinely inspired unanimity, what else has he to do, but to defend the profane Nesterius, and maintain that an unjust sentence was passed upon him? And when he has run this length, he must go on and condemn the Universal Church of Christ, the Apostles and Prophets. the master builders of it; but especially the Apostle St. Paul, as the very off-scouring of the earth; HE MUST CONDEMN THE CHURCH; BECAUSE SHE HAS NEVER DEPARTED FROM THE FAITH ONCE DELIVERED TO BE KEPT AND CULTIVATED INVIOLABLY. St. Paul, because of his charge to Timothy, 'O Timothy keep that which is committed to thy trust, avoiding profane novelties of words.' And for the curse also pronounced by him, whosoever shall preach unto you any other Gospel, than that which ye have received, let him be accursed.'

"Though the testimonies produced might be abundantly sufficient to confound and abolish all sorts of profane, impious novelties whatever; yet, for an overweight to all that has been said, I have thought fit to superadd A DOUBLE AUTHORITY OF HOLY POPE XYSTUS, THE PRESENT VENERABLE ORNAMENT OF THE ROMAN CHURCH; the other, of POPE CELESTINE, HIS PREDECESSOR OF BLESSED MEMORY; for that too, if I judge right, may be reasonably interposed in this place. Thus then, Pope Xystus expresses himself in his Epistle to the Bishop of Antioch, in the case of Nestorius. 'Since therefore, as the Apostle says, there is but one Faith, and that one Faith has evidently prevailed, let us believe what we are to teach, and teach what we are to believe. And what those things are we must believe and teach, he tells us in these words: That there is nothing left for novelty to do, because nothing new is to be added to the ancient faith; let this ancient faith then, like a pure fountain, flow undisturbed, and be never fouled with any mixture of mud. Spoke like an Apostle! And the perspicuity of the primitive faith is handsomely set forth by the clearness of a fountain, and the defilements of novelty as aptly expressed by the metaphor of mud. "And with Xystus, does Pope Celestine exactly agree in every point, in his letter to the Bishops of France; wherein he taxes their lukewarmness, that instead of contending earnestly for the ancient faith, they deserted it by a criminal silence, and by such a connivance, gave encou-Second part.) ragement for profane novelties to spring up and grow amongst them; in this letter, I say, the Pope thus delivers himself: 'If we, by our silence, give our consent for the coming in of error, the sin. lies justly at our doors; let such wretches therefore stand corrected, let them be no longer tolerated to vent their extravagance at pleasure.' But here we may put in, and ask who these wise men are, that they may not be allowed to speak their thoughts so freely? Are they the Preachers of old, or the Holders forth of new doctrine? Let him answer for himself, and satisfy the reader from his own mouth; for thus it follows "if it be so,' that is, if it be as some tell me, it is in your eities and provinces, that by your pernicious connivance and dissimulation, your people have been prevailed upon

"Now if the decrees of the Apostles, and the Canons-of the Church, are not to be violated; and if these, by the sacred consent of universal antiquity, were always the rules of proceeding against all heretics, in all times, and by which rules in this last age, Palagius, Celestins, and Nestorius, stand justly and righteously condemned; then it is unquestionably necessary for all Catholics hereafter,.who study to prove themselves true sons of their Mother the Church, to stick fast and firm, to live and die in the Holy Faith of the Holy Fathers; and to detest, abhor, pursue and prosecute, the profane novelties of profane innovaters." (Chapter iii,

Gentle readers, we have now concluded our quotations from St. Vincent; we have been tedious it is true, But the nature of the subject under discussion required grave and convincing proofs from antiquity. We appeal to the protestant portion of our readers if the "extracts" have not clearly established the fact, that the primitive Church admitted the Divine Maternity of the B. V. Mary; and consequently as Protestants in this, as well as in many other things, are opposed to the teachings of the Catholic Church at her earliest periods, they can lay no claim to the title of Catholic,-and are therefore by heresy cut off from the communion of the one sheepfold of the one Shepherd;. THE HOUSE OF FAITH, AND THE. RETREAT OF THE WANDERER..

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