But it is a deception, and a most dangerous one, to conclude that if a free passage were given to the torrent, it would lose, by diffusion, its ability to do injury.

The checks, as your Lordship well knows, which are after a time necessary to provoke other sects to activity, are not wanted here.

The Roman Church stands independent of them through its constitution, so exquisitely contrived, and through its doctrine and discipline, which give a peculiar and monstrous power to its priesthood.

In proof of this, take the injunction of celibacy, alone separating the priesthood from the body of the community, and the practice of confession, making them masters of the conscience, while the doctrines give them an absolute power over the will.

To submit to such thraldom men must be bigoted in its favour; and that we see is the case of Spain, in Portugal, in Austria, in Italy, in Flanders, in Ireland, and in all countries where you have Papacy in full blow.