own day. on Dec. 8, 1854, when this dogma, conceived in the silence of the cell by the brain of infatuated monks, was canonized by a helpless pontiff', and the doctrine es- tablished " that not only did the Virgin Mary imm.acu- lately conceive her son Jesus Christ (as Protestants hold), but was as immaculately conceived herself" (Hill, p. 314; comp. Krauth, Coiiservative Reformation, p. 381 sq.). Well, indeed, may it be said that " the contro- versy with Kome threatens more and more to resolve it- self into the question whether the creed of Christendom is to be based upon the life of Jesus or the life of Marj', upon the canonical or the apocryphal Gospels" (Plump- tre, Christ and Christendom [Boyle Lect. 1866], p. 342). Need we wonder, then, that Bishop Bull waxes warm when this abomination presents itself for his comments, and is made to speak in the following severe strain : " We abominate the impious imposture of those who have translated the most humble and holy Virgin into an idol of pride and vanity, and represented her as a vainglorious and aspiring creature ; like Lucifer (I trem- ble at the comparison), thirsting after divine worship and honor, and seeking out superstitious men and wom- en, whom she may oblige to her more special service, and make them her perpetual votaries. For what great- er affront than this could they have offered to her hu- mility and sanctity? How fulsome, yea, how perfectly loathsome to us are the tales of those that have had the assurance to tell us of the amorous addresses of the Blessed Virgin to certain persons, her devout worship- pers, choosing them for her husbands, bestowing her kisses liberally on them, giving them her breasts to suck, and presenting them with bracelets and rings of her hair as love-tokens ! The fables of the Jewish Tal- mudists, yea, of Mohammed, may seem grave, serious, and sober histories, compared to these and other such impudent fictions. Insomuch that wise men have thought that the authors of these romances in religion were no better than the tools and instruments of Satan, used by him to expose the Christian religion, and ren- der it ridiculous, and thus introduce atheism. And, in- deed, we are sure that the wits of Italy, where these abominable deceits have been and are chiefly counte- nanced, were the first broachers and patrons of infidelity and atheism in Europe, since the time that Christianity obtained in it." " We honor the Virgin Mary," says Mr. Endell Tyler ( Worship), p. 391), one of the latest and most critical students of early Church historj- and Chris- tian antiquities, " we love her memory, we AvoiUd, by God's grace, follow her example in faith and humility, meekness and obedience ; we bless God for the wonderful work of salvation, in effecting which she was a chosen vessel ; we call her a blessed saint and a holy Virgin ; we cannot doubt of her eternal happiness through the merits of him who was 'God of the substance of his Fa- tlier before the world, and man of the substance of his mother born in the world.' But we cannot address re- ligious phrases to her ; we cannot trust in her merits, or intercession, or advocacy, for oiur acceptance with God ; we cannot invoke her for any blessing, temporal or spir- itual ; we cannot praj- to God through her intercession, or for it. This in us would be sin. We pray to God alone; we offer religious praise, our spiritual sacrifices, to God alone ; we trust in tiod alone ; we need no other mediator, we apply to no other mediator, intercessor, or advocate, in the unseen world, but Jesus Christ alone, the Son of God and the Son of man. In this faith we implore God alone, for the sake only of his Son, to keep us steadfast unto death ; and, in the full assurance of the belief that this faith is founded on the apostles and prophets, Jesus Christ himself being the chief corner- stone, we will endeavor, by the blessing of the Eternal Sheiiherd and Bishop of souls, to preserve the same faith, as our Church now professes it, whole and unde- tiled, and to deliver it down, ^vithout spot or stain of su- perstition, to our children's children, as their best inher- itance forever."
Literature, — Bonaventura, Op€ra,vol, i, part ii,p.4G6-
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