Father Tom and the Pope. Father Tom and the Pope, OR A Night in the Vatican. NEW YORK: A. SIMPSON & CO., 1867. Agathynian Press, 60 Duane Street, N.Y. [Illustration] PREFACE. There are several questions which at this present time remain unsettled. One of them is, "_who invented gunpowder?_" Another is, which of them was it, Faust or Guttemberg, "_that invented printing?_" Another is, "_whether the Deity created nature, or nature created itself?_" That is a poser. Another is "_whether the original egg was the parent of the chicken, or the egg was the original ancestor of that celebrated feathered fowl?_" "_De novum ovum_," says Xinctillios, "_inseperatum primero, cum possibilitas, et credentia, in meo judicio, quam supra calcis phospas, qui est_, in the bones of the chicken." In other words, and to make it plain to the reader, he, Xinctillios, cannot understand how it is possible for human comprehension to see a new laid egg, without permitting in his judgment the idea of phosphate of lime existing in the osseous structure of the bones of the original hen. St. Bardolphus entertains a contrary opinion, "_Anam, aname, mona mike_," says he, "_Barcelona bona strike_," says he, "_harum scarum, wy frone whack!_" (I give you the original Coptic) "_Harrico barrico, we won frac!_" Between these two contending opinions I have nothing to say. The dogmas of the Roman Catholic Church, and the _folatreries_ of the philosophers of the high school of nature, differ so widely, that it is impossible for common sense to adopt either the one or the other--and the Greek Church on these points has given no decided opinion! Such a dilemma presents itself when we come to consider the contents of this volume. Who wrote it? Some say, Lord Brougham; and some attribute it to the Duke of Wellington, who understood the Irish vernacular to a dot. I have a shrewd suspicion that Maginn, a high tory, although a good Roman Catholic, and one of the prominent contributors to _Blackwood_, lent his helping hand to it, if he were not the _real_ author of it all? "Howandiver," to use a phrase of the author, let us look into the history of it.