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protestant religion might, and would suffer, and ultimately be made subservient to the power of its enemy. It is a bold assertion, that the religion of Rome would be rooted out of these islands, if the professors of it were admitted to all the privileges of the protestant citizens of the British empire. The rich man asserted in the place of torment where his vices had unhappily carried him, that his brothers would repent, if "one was sent to them from the dead." The truth of the assertion was not admitted by Abraham. And if living amongst protestants, as they now do, and having full opportunity of examining their religion, and witnessing their benevolent conduct, produces no effective change in the religious sentiments of Catholics, neither would the enabling them to rise to posts of honor and wealth, in the protestant govern~ ment of Britain, produce the effect of making them renounce their errors, and adopt the doctrine of the church of Christ.- -As the dissolute habits of intemperate pleasure and vicious indulgence of manhood, are seldom relinquished, till the day of necessity unexpectedly arrives-and as the greater the means of indulging their propensities, the more men set the laws of propriety and virtue at defiance;

so, the religious errors and corruptions of people, competent to distinguish between falsehood and truth, are seldom forsaken,-(more particularly when power and wealth place them too high to hear the remarks of their friends)-till they feel

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"the sickle of the harvest-man, or the edge of "the sharp scythe of the vintager." (5)---EDICTS OF JUSTINIAN.

Although "the civil jurisprudence of the empire might be well digested by Justinian, "in the immortal works of the Code, the Pan"dects, and the Institutes," yet his theological opinions deserve not the same unqualified eulogy, nor to be held in the same esteem and veneration. The members of the church of Christ, do not admit the truth of some of the religious propositions of the emperor, which sycophantizing Pope John acknowledged, and proclaimed to be, the only true faith:-neither do they hold, that forcing his faith upon people, and anathematizing every one who would not damn all those, whom he and the Pope called heretics, is agreeable to the doctrine of Christ :-He invites all, but compels none to come to him:-It is to be feared that the persecuting spirit of Justinian still breathes in the head of the Roman Church, and that his edicts are still more admired, and his directions better practised, than the bible and its laws and precepts, by the people of the Roman communion.—For, when a passage of the bible is quoted by them, it is curious to observe how little it seems to have been weighed and considered; and therefore it is not to be wondered at, if the passage should have a wrong construction put upon it, and be insiduously made

use of to inflame the minds of ignorant people, who put implicit confidence in the knowledge of their priests, and are easily persuaded to believe, that the long and violent speeches of their catholic and protestant advocates, contain nothing but incontrovertible truths. The great grandson of Abraham, was instructed in the worship of Jehovah from his infancy, and in consequence of being steady and uniform in his devotion, it is said, that "God was always with him."—The blessing of heaven descended to his children, and the prophetic spirit of Jacob declared, "that both Ephraim and Manasseh, should become a

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great people, that they should grow into a "multitude in the midst of the earth;-that "the younger brother's seed should become a "multitude of nations--and that in him should "Israel bless, saying, God make thee as E

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phraim and Manasseh."-And according to the blessing and the prophecy, the children of Israel were "fruitful, and increased abundantly, "and multiplied, and waxed exceeding mighty, "and the land of Egypt was filled with them." The oppression of Pharaoh could not defeat the purposes of heaven.-The increase of Israel went on, notwithstanding the cruel means, adopted by Egyptian tyranny to restrain it.But why did the deity permit his particular people to endure such injustice and affliction?— The answer may be this:-Jacob and his family carried into Egypt the knowledge of the true

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God, and of the worship that was due to him ; but, their descendants did not preserve and guard that knowledge and that worship, from the pollution of Egyptian darkness and idolatry, as they ought to have done-Perhaps, the observation has much truth in it, that, when the "new king arose in Egypt who knew not Jo"seph", the generality of Jacob's and Joseph's descendants knew not God.-Hence, the dreadful punishment of slavery, with all its evils, and all its horrors, were deservedly experienced by that stiff-necked people;-at the same time,, the design of that punishment was correction, not extinction :—the prophecy remained unaltered, and untouched by their corruption :they still "increased and multiplied:"—for the lamp of God was in existence amongst them, though the flame emitted a light, that was dimly seen through the gloom and darkness of their sins and iniquities.-The situation of the Catholics in Ireland, bears but little resemblance to that of the Israelites in Egypt:-the latter were one, entire, undivided people-strangers in the midst of an idolatrous nation;—the former, are the remnant of an apostate peoplethe subjects of a great nation that has renounced its errors, superstition, and false worship; and shewing anger and displeasure against the protestant government under which they live, because it refuses to look upon falsehood, as it looks upon truth.-The seed of Ephraim and Manasseh are still very numerous, and

increasing, though in affliction and under oppression; in no place more cruelly tyrannized over, than where catholic intolerance has the ascendant, and the worshippers of images have the power to inflict torture upon heietics, and marks and balges of slavery upon men, who worship only Jehovah, the God of their fathers ; upon the descendants of Abraham, who notwithstanding their present obstinacy and unbelief, will soon bend their knees at the name of Christ, and rise into notice, and consequence, and power again, whilst their idolatrons and false-worshipping enemies, shall flee before them, and with their religious pageantry be driven from the face of the earth. The parallelism is not less unjust, than it is particularly inapplicable, as it regards the conduct of the Israelites towards the government of Egypt, and that of the Catholics of Ireland towards the government of Britain.-The son of Jacob had preserved the lives of the people of Egypt, and had averted from that land the horrors of a long protracted famine;-but it does not apppear that this great event was set up as a plea, for clamorously insisting upon a different treatment from that which they received.-The foundation of their religion, was God. The foundation of the Egyptian religion, was ignorance, upon which was raised a calf, a bull, and a crocodile, for the homage of the senseless multitude. Corrupted and depraved in their understandings as were some of the Israelites,

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