When religious struggles are the ruling passion and great practical business of an epoch,--when different creeds are arrayed, wielding temporal as well as spiritual arms, with the mutual hope of subjecting if not of extirpating,--I feel that Christian charity is difficult to exercise. The temptations are too strong, the interests too pressing to be surmounted. The Chancellor De L'Hopital and the President De Thou, though recommending peace to Catholics and Protestants, would hardly have dreamt, on the eve or the morrow of a massacre or a battle, of speaking to them of charity. {24} But when material strife has ceased, when religious liberty is established in manners as well as in the laws, when in fact and truth the different religious creeds are obliged to live peaceably one with another, why should not the desire arise of adorning and furthering peace by the exercise of charity? When the coarser passions are powerless, why should not the more mild and equitable feelings develope themselves? I know the force of traditions, of recollections, as well as the permanent differences which tend to support controversy, even when purely speculative. Nevertheless, prolonged peace and freedom have much influence in calming the soul. At this day we have before us a signal instance, and I do not hesitate to repeat that to which I gave utterance in the Bible Society:--"See what is passing in England; there, doubtless, the irritation of the Protestants is great, there is a general and passionate movement in favour of a popular and powerful faith. The government itself associates with and follows this movement. English Protestantism shows itself strongly inclined to seek security and satisfaction at the expense of the religious liberty of the Catholics. Well! although matters wear this appearance, nothing is really done; they dare not; they cannot; and in the bottom of their hearts they desire not to do so. Amidst this Protestant excitement, the religious liberty of English Catholics still remains and extends. They have liberty of worship; their churches are open, nay, increasing in number; their priests perform their duties without interruption: they possess the liberty of the press; they publicly defend their creed and their conduct, and have freedom of speech and power of voting in parliament, where they strenuously uphold their cause." {25} A noble sight, which, after having justly filled the friends of religious liberty with uneasiness, ought now to give them every satisfaction. The spirit of persecution had reappeared, that of justice and liberty met it face to face, and in spite of appearances remained master of the field. May Christians, Catholic and Protestant, at last acknowledge it; it will be hereafter more natural than they imagine, to live in the exercise of Christian charity, for they have lost the habit, almost the power of efficacious oppression.