conviction that reason and scripture were decidedly on the side
of Protestantism, the greater is the reluctant admiration with
which we regard that system of tactics against which reason and
scripture were employed in vain.

If we went at large into this most interesting subject we should
fill volumes. We will, therefore, at present, advert to only one
important part of the policy of the Church of Rome. She
thoroughly understands, what no other Church has ever understood,
how to deal with enthusiasts. In some sects, particularly in
infant sects, enthusiasm is suffered to be rampant. In other
sects, particularly in sects long established and richly endowed,
it is regarded with aversion. The Catholic Church neither submits
to enthusiasm nor proscribes it, but uses it. She considers it as
a great moving force which in itself, like the muscular power of
a fine horse, is neither good nor evil, but which may be so
directed as to produce great good or great evil; and she assumes
the direction to herself. It would be absurd to run down a horse
like a wolf. It would be still more absurd to let him run wild,
breaking fences, and trampling down passengers. The rational
course is to subjugate his will without impairing his vigour, to
teach him to obey the rein, and then to urge him to full speed.
When once he knows his master, he is valuable in proportion to
his strength and spirit. Just such has been the system of the
Church of Rome with regard to enthusiasts. She knows that, when
religious feelings have obtained the complete empire of the mind,
they impart a strange energy, that they raise men above the
dominion of pain and pleasure, that obloquy becomes glory, that
death itself is contemplated only as the beginning of a higher
and happier life. She knows that a person in this state is no