Since I made these extracts from the learned and celebrated doctors and canonized saints of former ages, my attention has been invited to the language now {381} used in forms of devotion, the spirit of which implies similar views of the power and love of the Virgin Mary, as the fountain of mercies to mankind, and the dispenser of every heavenly blessing. At the head of these modern works, I was led to read over again the encyclical letter of the present sovereign pontiff, from the closing sentences of which I have already made extracts. And referring his words to a test which we have more than once applied in a similar case--that of changing the name of the person, and substituting the name of God, or his blessed Son, I cannot see how the spirit of his sentiments falls in the least below the highest degree of religious worship. His words, in the third paragraph of his letter, as they appear in the Laity's Directory for 1833, are these:-- "But having at length taken possession of our see in the Lateran Basilic according to the custom and institution of our predecessors, we turn to you without delay, venerable brethren, and in testimony of our feelings towards you, we select for the date of our letter this most joyful day on which we celebrate the solemn festival of the most blessed Virgin's triumphant assumption into heaven, that she who has been through every great calamity our patroness and protectress, may WATCH OVER US WRITING TO YOU, AND LEAD OUR MIND BY HER HEAVENLY INFLUENCE to those counsels which may prove most salutary to Christ's flock." Let us substitute for the name of Mary, the holiest of all, The Eternal Spirit of Jehovah Himself; and will not these words be a proper vehicle of the sentiments of a Christian pastor? Let us fix upon Christmas-day, or Easter, or Holy Thursday, and what word expressive {382} of gratitude for past mercies to the supreme Giver of all good things, or of hope and trust in the guidance of the Spirit of counsel, and wisdom, and strength--of the most High God, who alone can order the wills and ways of men--might not a bishop of Christ's flock take from this declaration of the Sovereign Pontiff, and use in its first and natural sense, when speaking of the Lord Jehovah Himself? "We select for the date of our letter this most joyful day on which we celebrate the solemn festival of the most blessed Redeemer's nativity, (or glorious resurrection, or ascension,) that He who has been through every great calamity our patron and protector, may watch over us writing to you, and lead our mind by his heavenly influence to those counsels which may prove most salutary to Christ's flock."