It is difficult to conceive that principles leading to such results will ever again be allowed to prevail against the liberties and lives of Englishmen. But if, as some strangely apprehend it may, the Roman Catholic faith should regain the ascendancy in this country, it would be interesting and profitable to observe the course which would be adopted by those who are at once enamoured of establishments, and at deadly feud with popery. Some would, no doubt, be prepared, with Archdeacon Balguy, “to defend, not popery only, but paganism itself—every _established_ religion under heaven.” {48b} But it may reasonably be supposed that such a sentiment would, in the present day, be very generally discarded as antiquated and untenable. The following language of a contemporary clergyman may, probably, be considered as indicating the views with which the supposed event would be more generally met by protestant episcopalians. “If the presbyterians or papists were to-morrow the great majority of the nation, and if the constituted authorities of the land, king, lords, and commons, thinking either of these persuasions the best religion, were to establish it by law, _I should then become a dissenter_. With my belief in the scriptural authority of episcopacy, I could not conscientiously be a presbyterian; and with my knowledge of the antiscriptural doctrines of the church of Rome, _I must separate_ from her communion.” {49} The intelligent, conscientious, and consistent protestant would make his appeal, as did the martyrs, to the only supreme authority. Here, he would say, placing his hand upon the word of God, here alone, is “the religion of protestants:” “_Here_ is the judge that stints the strife When men’s devices fail; Here is the bread that feeds the life That _death cannot_ assail.” {50} By the light of reason and in the exercise of prayer for that better illumination which cometh from above, he would commit himself to this safe guide. While he would value the protection, and conform to the regulations, and discharge the imposts, of civil government, in reference to things pertaining to its province; if for his religious profession he endured suffering or privation, whatever its garb, its nature, or its extent, he would resist with firmness; or succumb with reluctance, and complain of persecution. The absence of the faggot or the rack would not be admitted to purge away the stain of injustice. {51a} Whether debarred of personal liberty, or of some minor privilege of citizenship; subject to a legal slaughter, or to a legal tax; he would regard the champions of established catholicism as trampling upon the just liberties of a Christian man. He could give them, at best, no more that the poor praise of having learned to imitate the Italian assassins, who beat their victims with satchels of sand: no blood is spilt and no bones are broken—but the sufferer dies by the operation. {51b}