There have been some minds so con

for three hundred years were unknown to cies, is that of my Lord Bolingbroke. the whole Roman empire, and at last ad- § But happily it is so voluminous, so destivanced from the dregs of the communitytute of method, so verbose and so aboundto the throne of the emperors, when policying in long and sometimes complicated compelled them to adopt the nonsense of sentences, that it requires a great deal of the people, in order to keep them the bet- patience to read him. ter in subjection. The declamations of the English priest do not approach in vehe-stituted, that they have been enchanted mence those of the priest of Champagne. by the miracles of Moses and Joshua, Woolston occasionally showed discretion, but have not entertained for those of Meslier never has any; he is a man so Jesus Christ the respect to which they sensitively sore to the crimes he has been are entitled. Their imagination,―raised witness to, that he renders the Christian by the grand spectacle of the sea opening religion responsible for them, forgetting a passage through its depths, and susthat it condemns them. There is not a pending its waves that a horde of Hesingle miracle which is not with him an brews might safely go through-by the object of scorn or horror, no prophecy ten plagues of Egypt, and by the stars which he does not compare with the pro- that stopped in their course over Gibeon phecies of Nostradamus. He even goes and Ajlon, &c.,-could not with ease so far as to compare Jesus Christ to Don and satisfaction be let down again, so as Quixote, and St. Peter to Sancho Panza; to admire the comparitively petty miraand what is most of all to be deplored is, cles of the water changed into wine, the that he wrote these blasphemies against withered fig-tree, and the swine drowned Jesus Christ, when he might be said to in the little lake of Gadara. be in the very arms of death,--at a moment when the most deceitful are sincere, and the most intrepid tremble. Too strongly impressed by some injuries that had been done him by his superiors in authority; too deeply affected by the great difficulties which he met with in the scripture, he became exasperated against it more than Acosta and all the Jews,--more than Porphyry, Celsus, Iamblichus, Julian, Libanius Maximus, Simmachus, or any other whatever of the partisans of human reason against the divine incomprehensibilities of our religion. Many abridgments of his work have been printed; but happily the persons in authority suppressed them as fast as they appeared

Vaghenseil said that it was like hearing a rustic ditty after attending to a grand concert.

The Talmud pretends that there have been many Christians who, after comparing the miracles of the Old Testament with those of the New, embraced Judaism; they considered it impossible that the Sovereign Lord of Nature should have wrought such stupendous prodigies for a religion he intended to annihilate. What! they exclaimed, can it possibly be, that for a series of ages he should have exhibited a train of astonishing and tremendous miracle in favour of a true religion that was to become a false one? What! can it be, that God himself has recorded that this religion shall never perish, and that those who attempt to destroy it shall be stoned to death, and yet that he has nevertheless sent his own Son, who is no other than himself, to mi-annihilate what he was employed so many ages in erecting!

A priest of Bonne-Nouvelle, near Paris, wrote also on the same subject: and it thus happened that at the very time the Abbé Becheran and the rest of the convulsionaries were performing racles, three priests were writing against the genuine gospel miracles.

The most clever work that has been written against the miracles and prophe

There is much more to be added to these remarks; this Son, they continue, this Eternal God, having made himself a

Jew, adheres to the Jewish religion during mated and emboldened by the example the whole of his life! he performs all of the Jewish saints, who confidently the functions of it, he frequents the Jew-professed Judaism before the prince of ish temple, he announces nothing con- Tyre and Babylon, he travelled baretrary to the Jewish law, and all his dis-footed to Geneva, to confess before the ciples are Jews and observe the Jewish judges and magistrates that there is only ceremonies. It most certainly is not he one religion upon earth, because there is who established the Christian religion. only one God; that that religion is the It was established by the dissident Jews Jewish; that it is absolutely necessary who united with the Platonist. There to become circumcised; and that it is a is not a single dogma of Christianity that horrible crime to eat bacon and blood was preached by Jesus Christ. pudding. He pathetically exhorted all the people of Geneva, who crowded to hear him, no longer to continue children of Belial, but to become good Jews, in order to deserve the kingdom of heaven. He was apprehended, and put in chains.

Such is the reasoning of these rash men, who, with minds at once hypocritical and audacious, dare to criticise the works of God, and admit the miracles of the Old Testament for the sole purpose of rejecting those of the New.

Of this number was the unfortunate Priest of Pont-à-Mousson in Lorraine, called Nicholas Anthony; he was known by no other name. After he had received what is called 'the four minors' in Lorraine, the Calvinistic preacher Ferri, happening to go to Pont-à-Mousson, raised in his mind very serious scruples, and persuaded him that the four minors were the mark of the beast. Anthony, driven almost to distraction at the thought of carrying about him the mark of the beast, had it immediately effaced by Ferri, embraced the Protestant religion, and became a minister at Geneva, about the year 1630.

The little council of Geneva, which at that period did nothing without consulting the council of preachers, asked their advice in this emergency. The most sensible of them recommended that poor Anthony should be bled in the cephalic vein, use the bath, and be kept upon gruel and broths; after which he might perhaps gradually be induced to pronounce the name of Jesus Christ, or at least to hear it pronounced, without grinding his teeth, as had hitherto been his practice. They added, that the laws bore with Jews; that there were eight thousand of them even in Rome itself; that many merchants are true Jews, and therefore that as Rome admitted within its walls eight thousand children of the synagogue, Geneva might well tolerate one. At the sound of 'toleration' the rest of the pastors, who were the majo(rity, gnashing their teeth still more than Anthony did at the name of Jesus Christ, and also eager to find an opportunity to burn a man, which could not be done every day, called peremptorily for the burning. They resolved, that nothing could serve more to establish genuine

With a head full of rabbinical learning, he thought that if the Protestants were right in reference to the Papists, the Jews were much more so in reference to all the different sects of Christianity whatever. From the village of Divonne, where he was pastor, he went to be received as a Jew at Venice, together with a young apprentice in theology whom he had persuaded to adopt his own principles, but who afterwards abandoned him, not experiencing any call to mar-Christianity; that the Spaniards had obtyrdom.

tained so much reputation in the world At first the minister, Nicholas Anthony, only by burning the Jews every year, and abstained from uttering the name of that after all, if the Old Testament must Jesus Christ in his sermons and prayers; prevail over the New, God would not in a short time however, becoming ani-fail to come and extinguish the flames of

A great number of writers, whose misfortune it was to be philosophers rather than Christians, have been bold enough to deny the miracles of our Lord; but after the four priests already noticed, there is no necessity to enumerate other instances. Let us lament over these four unfortunate men, led astray by their own

the pile, as he did at Babylon for Sha{ rach, Meshac, and Abednego; in which case all must go back again to the Old Testament; but that, in the mean time, it was indispensable to burn Nicholas Anthony. On the breaking up of the meeting, they concluded with the observation, "We must put the wicked out of the way"-the very words they used.deceitful reason, and precipitated by the The long-headed syndics Sarasin and gloom of their feelings into an abyss so Godefroi agreed that the reasoning of the dreadful and so fatal. Calvinistic sanhedrim was admirable, and by the right of the strongest party, condemned Nicholas Anthony, the weakest of men, to die the same death as Calanus and the counsellor Dubourg. This sentence was carried into execution on the twentieth of April, 1632, in a very beautiful lawn or meadow, called PlainPalais, in the presence of twenty thou-marks on the very curious and edifying sand persons, who blessed the new law, and the wonderful sense of the syndics Sarasin and Godefroi.

The God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, did not renew the miracle of the furnace of Babylon in favour of poor Anthony.

MISSION.

It is far from our subject in this article to reflect upon the zeal of our missionaries, or the truth of our religion; these are sufficiently known in Christian Europe, and duly respected.

My object is merely to make some re

letters of the reverend fathers, the Jesuits, who are not equally respectable. Scarcely do they arrive in India before they commence preaching, convert millions of Indians, and perform millions of miracles. Far be it from me to contradict their assertions. We all know how easy it must be to a Biscayan, a Bergamasque, or a Norman, to learn the Indian language in a few days, and preach like an Indian.

Abauzit, an author of great veracity, relates in his notes, that he died in the greatest constancy, and persisted in his opinions even at the stake on the pile: With regard to miracles, nothing is he broke out into no passionate invective more easy than to perform them at a against his judges when the executioner distance of six thousand leagues, since was tying him to the stake; he displayed so many have been performed at Paris, neither pride nor pusillanimity; he nei- in the parish of St. Medard. The sufficther wept nor sighed he was resigned. ing grace of the Molinists could undoubtNever did martyr consummate his sacri-edly operate on the banks of the Ganges, fice with a more lively faith; never did as well as the efficacious grace of the philosopher contemplate a death of horror Jansenists on those of the river of the with greater firmness. This clearly Gobelins. We have however said so proves that his folly or madness was at much already about miracles, that we all events attended with sincere convic-shall pursue the subject no farther. tion. Let us implore of the God both of the Old and New Testament that he will grant him mercy.

I would say as much for the Jesuit Malagrida, who was still more infatuated and mad than Nicholas Anthony; as I would also for the ex-Jesuits Patouillet and Paulian, should they ever be brought to the stake.

A reverend father Jesuit arrived in the course of the past year at Delhi, at the court of the great Mogul. He was not a man profoundly skilled in mathematics, or highly gifted in mind, who had come to correct the calendar, or to establish his fortune, but one of those poor honest zealous Jesuits, one of those soldiers who are dispatched on particular duty by

MONEY.

their general, and who obey orders without reasoning about them.

M. Andrais, my factor, asked him what his business might be at Delhi. He replied, that he had orders from the reverend father Ricci to deliver the Great

Mogul from the paws of the devil, and convert his whole court. I have already, he said, baptised twenty infants in the street, without their knowing anything at all about the matter, by throwing a few drops of water upon their heads. They are now just so many angels, provided they are happy enough to die directly. I cured a poor old woman of the megrims by making the sign of the cross behind her. I hope in a short time to convert the Mahometans of the court and the Gentoos among the people. You will see in Delhi, Agra, and Benares, as many good Catholics, adorers of the Virgin Mary, as you now do idolaters, adoring the devil?

M. ANDRAIS.

You think then, my worthy father, that the inhabitants of these countries adore idols and the devil!

THE JESUIT.

M. ANDRAIS.

231

But suppose that you should be informed against, and punished at the whipping-post?

THE JESUIT.

That also would be for his glory. However, I conjure you to keep my secret, and save me from the honour and happiness of martyrdom.

Harpagon asked Maître Jacques, Wilt thou make a good entertainment?—Yes, if you will give me plenty of money.

We continually inquire, which of the countries of Europe is the richest in money? By that we mean, which is the people who circulate the most metals representative of objects of commerce? In the same manner we ask, which is the

Undoubtedly, as they are not of my poorest? and thirty contending nations religion.

M. ANDRAIS.

Very well. But when there are as many Catholics in India as idolaters, are you not afraid that they will fight against one another; that blood will flow for a long period, and the whole country be a This scene of pillage and devastation? has happened in every country in which you have obtained a footing hitherto.

THE JESUIT.

present themselves-the Westphalian, Limosin, Basque, Tyrolese, Valois, Grison, Istrain, Scotch, and Irish, the Swiss of a small canton, and above all the subjects of the pope.

In deciding which has most, we hesitate at present between France and Spain, and Holland, which had none in 1600.

Formerly in the thirteenth, fourteenth, and fifteenth centuries, the province of the papal treasury had no doubt the most ready money and therefore the You make one pause for a moment; greatest trade. How do you sell that? but nothing could happen better than would be asked of a theological merchant, that which you suggest as being so pro-who replied, For as much as the people bable. The slaughtered Catholics would are fools enough to give me. go to paradise (to the garden), and the All Europe then sent its money to the Gentoos to the everlasting fire of hell, Roman court, who gave in change concreated for them from all eternity, ac-secrated beads, agnuses, indulgences cording to the great mercy of God, and plenary and limited, dispensations, confor his great glory; for God is exceed-firmations, exemptions, benedictions, and ingly glorious. even excommunications against those

whom the subscribers chose, and who,-perhaps this imprudence has turned had not sufficient faith in the court of out a very wise thing." Rome.

We see by the enormous power of Philip, that the pretended council of Francis I. could not have done such a wise thing. But let us content ourselves with remarking, that Francis I. was not

The Venetians sold nothing of all this, but they traded with all the west by Alexandria, and it was through them only that we had pepper and cinnamon. The money which went not to the papal trea-born when it is pretended that he refused sury came to them, excepting a little to the offers of Christopher Columbus. The the Tuscans and Genoese. All the other Genoese captain landed in America in kingdoms of Europe were so poor in 1492, and Francis I. was born in 1497, ready money, that Charles VIII. was and ascended not the throne until 1515. obliged to borrow the jewels of the Let us here compare the revenues of Duchess of Savoy, and put them in pawn, Henry III. Henry IV. and Queen Elizato raise funds to conquer Naples, which beth, with those of Philip II. The orhe soon lost again. The Venetians sup-dinary income of Elizabeth, was only one ported stronger armies than his. A hundred thousand pounds sterling, and noble Venetian had more gold in his cof-with extras it was, one year with another, fers, and more vessels of silver on his table, than the Emperor Maximillian surnamed 'Pochi danari.'

four hundred thousand; but she required this surplus to defer.d herself from Philip II. Without extreme economy she would have been lost, and England with her.

time; this, to the sum that Philip drew from the Indies, was as three to ten; but not more than a third of this money entered into the coffers of Henry III., who was very prodigal, greatly robbed, and consequently very poor. We find that Philip II. in one article was ten times richer than Henry.

Things changed when the Portuguese traded with India as conquerors, and the The revenue of Henry III. indeed inSpaniards subjugated Mexico and Perucreased to thirty millions of livres of his with six or seven hundred men. We know that then the commerce of Venice, and the other towns of Italy all fell to the ground. Philip II. the master of Spain, Portugal, the Low Countries, the Two Sicilies, and the Milanese, of fifteen hundred leagues of coasts in Asia, and mines of gold and silver in America, was the only rich, and consequently_the only As to Heary IV. it is not worth while powerful prince in Europe. The spies to compare his treasures with those of whom he gained in France kissed on their Philip II. Until the peace of Vervins, knees the Catholic doubloons, and the he had only what he could borrow or small number of angels and caroluses win at the point of his sword; and he which circulated in that country had not lived as a knight-errant, until the time much credit. It is pretended that Ame-in which be became the first king in Eurica and Asia brought him in nearly ten million ducats of revenue. He would have really bought Europe with his money, but for the iron of Henry IV, and the fleets of Queen Elizabeth.

rope.

England had always been so poor, that King Edward III. was the first king who coined money of gold.

Would we know what became of the The Dictionaire Encyclopedique, in money which flowed continually from the article 'Argent,' quotes the Spirit of Mexico and Peru into Spain? It enLaws, in which it is said, "I have heard tered the pockets of the French, English, deplored, a thousand times, the blind- and Dutch who traded with Cadiz under ness of the council of Francis I. who Spanish names; and who sent to Amerejected the proposal of Christopher Co- rica the productions of their manufactolumbus for the discovery of the Indies:ries. A great part of this money goes