_I stand forth against the Romish hierarchy, because it is the means of crushing my dignity as a man, and reducing me to a state of disgraceful servitude._ The dignity of man is acknowledged to consist in his reason and his will, and in the unrestrained use of both, for the attainment of moral freedom,--"Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect." As Romish priest I dare not freely exercise my reason and my will. As such I only dare to think, and speak, and write, what the Church decrees, or what my superiors may allow. If I think, or speak, or write, more or otherwise, I am declared to be a _heretic_, i.e. a most grievous criminal. God himself must only be conceived of and adored, according to dictation of the Romish Church; and even He dares to accept no other adoration at my hands, than that prescribed by the Romish Church, in which, forsooth, salvation only can be found. As Romish priest I have no freedom, either of thought or conscience. Neither can I boast, as such, of any of the other rights of man, in opposition to my superior,--him I must blindly obey. The Romish priest is not regarded as a being personally free, but as an automaton, employed to spread abroad the mist of superstition. To cast off this bondage, and become a free moral agent, is a holy duty and injunction of the Christian religion, which demands freedom in the exercise of virtue. In order, however, to convince all men more clearly of the urgent nature of this duty, I shall attempt a feeble portraiture of the paralyzing influence exerted on myself, by priestly oppression, while I held an office in the Church--a portraiture in which the chief features in the case of hundreds among my colleagues may, at the same time, be recognized. I felt a morbid irritability in contemplating the consecrated barriers which cut me off from my fellow-men; my spirit, sympathy, and active impulse died away, and in their place, in spite of my endeavours, cold indifference, and emotions even of hatred crept upon me. I likewise felt a suspicion of my colleagues, inexplicable in its earlier stages, and, in particular, I shunned those friends in whose society I had passed the unfettered years of college life, in order that I might not unnecessarily open the wounds which the loss of my freedom had inflicted on my heart.* * I have often heard the complaint made, that the younger members of the Catholic priesthood keep aloof from former friends; a moving cause is given above, which may lead us rather to compassionate than to condemn them.