MISERABILE DICTU !
We recollect that in the beginning of the famous Crimean war, when the Russians had unexpectedly inflicted chastisement on the Turks at Sinope, an illustration appeared in ' Punch/ in which was represented a rustic politician sitting upon a stile with a newspaper in his hand, while he commented lucidly upon the intelligence received, in rural phrase which we shall not attempt to reproduce, and found himself puzzled to the very extremity of head-scratching at discovering that it was the wrong party that had gained the victory, that had, in fact, carried the fight into the enemy's country, instead of quietly abiding at home to be thrashed by the allied forces as it was expected. Now the phenomena of the human mind, as exhibited in one [individual, are frequently similar to those shown under like circumstances by another ; hence, in observing the consternation — albeit expressed in more erudite terms — of certain worthies who have come under our observation, we have been reminded of 'Punch's' cartoon. Divers ministers of the Presbyterian persuasion have lately met in Edinburgh, to hold a wringiug of hands and a gnashing of teeth, over the encroachments of " Popery." Who'd have thought it 1 One would have expected that ere this the affair would have been altogether stamped out ; but c'est autre chose, for while the gentle inhabitants of the evangelical dove-cot have been cooing in applause of every carrion-loving vulture that hovered minatory over Europe for the last half-century, while they have been approbatory of Mazzini, and gushing to foam over Garibaldi, lo and behold! their own precious vineyard has been sown with tares, and a full crop is springing under tbeir very noses. Hech, sirs, its just awfu'! But we know what kind of chiels facts are, and there is no use in trying to trifle with them. What has become of the " Protestant tradition I" Was it not laid down as an axiom, that all required to wean the popular mind from "Popery," in any given country, was that the stomach should be well lined with comfortable food, the back well covered with warm garments, and that certain passages, clipped here and there from Holy Writ, should become stereotyped on the brim. For this, the overthrow of governments has been hailed with acclamation, the right hand of fellowship extended to pirate and assassin, and a halo of sanctity thrown over households in which the " cutty-stool" would he an article of furniture as fitting as in the cell of Effie Deans itself, or even more so. But while heaven and earth have been compassed to make one proselyte in Italy or i Ireland, and the worldly advancement of toe people tampered '■> jLfy has been the means adopted, here it is discovered that persons possessed of all temporal advantages, and highly educated in the bargain, have being going over in numbers to the enemy. Already their mark is made upon the country. Hear what has offended Dr. Begg, and caused that just man hardly less vexation than the righteous soul of the patriarch of old derived from the conversation of the wicked of his day. In the south of Scotland there is a " new Romish chapel, built chiefly by three perverts from Protestantism," and — oh, horror of horrors ! — an edifice that was formerly a " Free Church consecrated a Romish chapel ;" then there is that " portentous event," the establishment of a large monastery in the north, and the " perversion of some of the most powerful aristocracy." Shade of John Knox ! thou sturdy demagogue and truculbnt enforcer of heresy, has, then, the " pented bredd" and the things it symbolised had a more real life than the system thy blasphemous tongue supported ? This looks
like it, for after three centuries the dead and worthless do not return, nor does the immortal fade towards perishing. But, after all, Dr. Begg almost hit the right nail on the head. He attributed the principal reason of the change to growing infidelity. And it is so, in part, as he might have known long since had he been in the habit of studying Catholic authors, for, from the first, it was by them foretold that the so-called " Reformation" would end in unbelief, pure and simple, and that the day would come when the Church would stand on one side and Atheism on the other, without a medium. That day is advancing rapidly, and if the rev. doctor lives but a little longer, he is destined to see a further development of the fact — let Exeter Hall and the Presbytery howl never so keenly.
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New Zealand Tablet, Volume IV, Issue 205, 9 March 1877, Page 11
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761MISERABILE DICTU! New Zealand Tablet, Volume IV, Issue 205, 9 March 1877, Page 11
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