The Evening Star MONDAY, JUNE 28, 1875.

Evening Star, Issue 3851, 28 June 1875, Page 2

The Evening Star MONDAY, JUNE 28, 1875.

That very touchy journal, tho ‘ New Zealand Tablet ’ has favored its readers with an essay on “Cant," in which-it has the arrogance to assume that the Evening Star was guilty of using “dang phrases of ignorance and bigotry in publishing the following sentence:—

The determination of Bismabok to free Germany from ecclesiastical dominion, and the resistance of the Eomish Church to patriotic - could not be overlooked, nor could Ssg.lML de of the dignitaries of that Church JWrapgrotestant institutions in all Protestant council throughout the world. We do not think it necessary to enter upon an elaborate defence of these statements. However the * Tablet’ may attempt to disguise it, what the Prussian Government has to contend with is a determined effort on the part of many of the dignitaries and priesthood of the Romish Chursh to exercise ecclesiastical power calculated to neutralise and over-ride the laws of the State; and, however angry the ‘Tablet’ may be, we take leave to think and claim the right to say that In our opinion the Prussian Government is ouly fulfilling its duty in refusing to recognise such assumption. There can be no social unity where one class is allowed privileges or exemptions denied to another. In the eye of a temporal government ©very man’slright, to the free exercise of religion should be recognised ; hut if there af© priests who claim to administer laws dictated by a foreign potentate which, clash with, and ot the realm, there caiuhe ho alternative; they have placed in .the position of liave no right to complain if subjected to punishment. That is, actually the position of those “bishops, priests, and nuns” who are representedhy the ‘Tablet ’ as being robbed, banished, imprisoned, or as it falsely says, “slaughtered,” is fully acknowledged in one or two paragraphs in the article we allude to. For instance, in the following passage : Has not Liberalism in Germany put its foot on the necks of bishops, priests, and nuns in «iat unhappy land? Has it not framed laws m direct antagonism to the constitution of the Kingdom of Prussia and of the Empiro, for the express purpose of plundering, imprisonand banishing Catholics, whose conduct had, all their previous lives, been so examplary, so law-abiding, that not even one breach of the laws of the State could be alleged against tZI T p hli ia And these B May /—who made them ? Not the German or Russian Parliament, but one section happening for the time being to be in a majority, for lnf„r le P T e °J inflicting the greatest i? 1 ?, tbe seetion which unanimously resisted their enactment and protested against it. these laws are not the outcome of reason, ot E'arhameMary discussion, of fair compromise, of statesmanship—but the result of brute force, of the stubborn unreason and persecuting proclivities of a heartless and Godless majority, determined to ride rough-shod over fifteen millions of Catholics. This tirade against Liberalism is an excellent specimen of “cant,” combined with rant. It pi’oves beyond question the whole case for Bismarck. So long as the laws that suited a section

of the Romish Church were intact—for all have not resisted—the bishops, priests, and nuns obeyed them; but when it was found necessary, for the sake of social unity—not for the sake of persecution and robbery—to amend and alter them, they refused to submit to them. We have no doubt of .the piety, purity of life, and devotion of* the sufferers. Though we are denounced by the ‘ Tablet ’ as “ apostate ” and “ persecutor,” we pity the sufferers and regret that they did not better understand their duties as citizens. These are our views; and having no fear of the Inquisition, we dare to express them, and at the same time to say that it is equally the interest of Roman Catholics and Protestants that the most perfect freedom should be secured for the exercise of religion according to conscience. We ask this at the hands of Government equally for their sakes as for our own, and should be prepared to resist to the utmost any infraction of the principle toward them, equally as if it were directed against ourselves. But we have not done with the * Tablet ’; We would put it to impartial judges whether what is condemned as “ cant in a Liberal journal, changes its character when it appears in a Roman Catholic periodical. We are charged with “cant”—that is, we suppose, using depreciatory phrases in common use having no meaning—on account of using the terms “ ecclesiastical dominion ” and “attitude towards Protestant in-

stitutions. We have shown that to the first we do attach a meaning, and could easily explain the latter were it needful. But what does our contemporary mean by the expression “embrace the religion of apostates and persecutors ”? Has the * Tablet ’ the hardihood and ignorance to use the term “ apostate ” to the millions of Protestants who never believed in Romish doctrines j and to whom the term cannot apply? Next, the Liberal Press, or Liberalism, to whose efforts the Roman Catholic Church owes the removal of all civil and religious disabilities in Great Britain, and the consequent freedom they enjoy in the Colonies, is charged with advocating “cruel persecution,” with “ denying all truth,” with “revolutionising the State,” and with, we suppose, aiding and abetting in attempts lo rob, banish, imprison, and slaughter people r r y use to k* come traitors to the commands of trod, at their bidding; and that all who wul not join them in doing what they pleas#, even in defiance of truth and justice, shall be trampled under foot and reduced to slavery. These and similar phrases are to be found ad nauseam in the writings of Romish authors from the time of the Reformation to this day. They are hackneyed and time-worn. They were never less applicable to British communities than at present, for we live under equal laws, and but for such slanders would, bear to each other mutual respect. There- is really no meaning in them as applied to ourselves, and they come fairly under the designation of “ cant.” We recommend our canting, ranting contemporary in future to be more courteous, more truthful, and more cautious, for in condemning another it has emphatically pronounced its own condemnation.